WOBNIA 


"BRIGHT-EYED   FANCY,  HOVERING   O'Eft, 
SCATTERS  FROM  HER  PICTURED  URN 
THOUGHTS  THAT  BREATHE  AND  WORDS 
THAT  BURN." 


aWHOLOGY  I 


UNIVERSITY  OF  CALIFORNIA 
AT   LOS  ANGELES 


ROBERT   ERNEST  COWAN 


- 


California  Anthology: 


Striking    I  hough ts  on   Many   Ihemes, 


CAREFULLY   SELECTED   FROM 


CALIFORNIA  WRITERS  AND  SPEAKERS, 


OSCAR     T.  L3HUCK, 


COMPILER  OF  THE  "CALIFORNIA  SCRAP  BOOK"  AND   EDITOR  OF 
"  REPRESENTATIVE  MEN  OF  TIIF.  PACIFIC." 


SAN    FRANCISCO: 

FROM  THE  PRESS  OF  BARRY   &   BAIRD,  419  SACRAMENTO  ST. 

A.  J.  LRARY,  PUBLISHER,  402  AND  404  SANSOME  ST. 

1880. 


KXTKNNU.    ACCORIHM1   T<>  A(T  OK    <'<lX<tHKSS,    IN    TIIK    YEAR    1880, 

Bv  OSCAR  T    SHUCK, 
Ix  run  Omen  or  Tim  LIBRARIAN  OP  CoxonnM,  AT  WAMIIINOTON,  I).  C. 


PS 

5-7  / 


I  VENTURE  TO  INSCRIBE 


THIS    VOLUME 


DISTINGUISHED     CITIZEN     OF     CALIFORNIA, 


A    CONSPICUOUS   PILLAR,    AND    A    FORMER 

CO 

GOVERNOR,  OF  THE  STATE, 


WUOSB  PERMISSION,    OX   ACCOl'NT  OF  1IIS   ABSENCE   IN  EUROPE,    I    HAVE 
NOT  BEEN  ABLE  TO  SOLICIT, 


THE  HON.   LELAND    STANFORD, 


NOTED  ALIKE  FOR  THE   HEAL.TH FULNESS  OF  HIS'  PUBLIC  SPIRIT 
AND  THE  PURITY  OF  HIS  PRIVATE  LIFE. 


THE  EDITOR. 


354962 


NAMES   OF   WRITERS   AND   SPEAKERS   QUOTED   IN 
THIS  VOLUME. 


ANDERSON,  REV.  T.  H.  B. 
BAKER,  GEN.  E.  D. 
BALDWIN,  JOSEPH  G. 
BANCROFT,  HUBERT  H. 
BARNES,  GEN.  W.  H.  L. 
BARSTOW,  GEORGE 
BARTLETT,  W.  C. 
BAUSMAN,  WILLIAM 
BELL,  SAMUEL  B. 
BENNETT,  NATHANIEL 
BONTE,  REV.  J.  H.  C. 
BOOTH,  NEWTON 
BIERCE,  A.  G. 
BRIGGS,  REV.  M.  C. 
BROWNE,  J.  Ross 
BUNKER,  WM.  M. 
BURNETT,  PETER  H. 
CASSERLY,  EUGENE 
CLARKE,  CHAS.  RUSSELL 
COLLINS,  GEN.  JOHN  A 
COOLBRITH,  INA  D. 
COOPER,  SARAH  B. 
CRADDOCK,  CHAS.  F. 
CRITTENDEN,  R.  D. 
CURTIS,  N.  GREENE 
BALL,  W.  H. 
DAVIDSON,  PROF.  GEORGE 
DEERING,  F.  P. 
DWINELLE,  JOHN  W. 
EWER,  REV.  F.  C. 
FELTON,  JOHN  B. 
FIELD,  JUDGE  STEPHEN  J. 
FINNEY,  SELDEN  J. 
FISHER,  PHILIP  M- 
FITCH,  THOMAS 


FOOTE,  GEN.  L.  H. 
FREELON,  T.  W. 
FREMONT.  GEN.  J.  C. 
GEORGE,  HENRY 
GOODMAN,  JOSEPH  T. 
GORDON,  GEORGE 
GRAY,  DR.  HENRY  M. 
GUARD,  REV.  THOMAS 
HALLIDIE,  A.  S. 
HAMILTON,  REV.  L. 
HARMON,  J.  B. 
HARTE,  F.  BRET 
HAYES,  WILLIAM 
HIGHTON,  HENRY  E. 
HOWARD,  J.  G. 
HURLBUT,  G.  C. 
IJAMS,  REV.  W.  E. 
KELLOGG,  PROF.  MARTIN 
KENDALL,  W.  A. 
KEWEN,  COL.  E.  J.  C. 
KING,  THOMAS  STARR 
LATHAM,  MILTON  S. 
LE  CONTE,  PROF.  JOHN 
LE  CONTE,  PROF.  JOSEPH 
MARSHALL,  E.  C. 

MCDONALD,  Dli.   R.  H. 

McDoucALL,  GEN.  JAS.  A. 
MCKINSTRY,  JUDGE.  E.  W. 
MONTGOMERY,  ZACHARY 
MOORE,  GEORGE  R. 
NEALE,  MRS.  JAMES 
O'CoNNELL,  DANIEL 
PIXLEY,  F.  M. 
PLATT,  REV.  WILLIAM  H. 
PRATT,  JUDGE  L.  E. 


NAMES    OF    WRITERS    AND    SPEAKERS. 


PRATT,  JUDGE  0.  C. 
PROFFATT,  JOHN 
RANDOLPH,  EDMUND 
REDDING,  B.  B. 
REID,  HENRY  H. 
RHODHS,  W.  H. 
ROBINSON,  TOD 
ROYCE,  JOSIAH 
SARGENT,  A.  A. 
SCOTT,  REV.  DR.  W.  A. 
SHAFTER,  JAS.  McM. 
SHATTUCK,  JUDGE  D.  O. 
SHINN,  CHARLES  H. 
SHORE,  DR.  J.  C. 
SHURTLEFF,  DR.  G.  A. 
SILL,  E.  R. 

SKIDMORE,  Miss  H.  M. 
SOULE,  FRANK 
SPEER,  REV.  WILLIAM 
STANFORD,  LELAND 
STANLY,  EDWARD 


STEBBINS,  REV.  H. 
STODDARD,  CHAS.  WARRKN 
STONE,  REV.  DR.  A.  L. 
STOUT,  DR.  A.  B. 
STUART,  HECTOR  A. 
SULLIVAN,  FRANCIS  J. 
SUMNER,  CHAS.  A. 
SWIFT,  JOHN  F. 
TILFORD,  FRANK 
TOMPKINS,  EDWARD 
TUTHILL,  DR.  FRANKLIN 
UPHAM,  M.  J. 
WAITE,  E.  G. 
WARWICK,  J.  H. 
WATTSON,  JOHN  V. 
WHEELER,  J(UDGE  E.  D. 
WINANS,  JOSEPH  W. 

WlNCHELL,  JrUGE  E.  C. 

WILLIAMS,  SAMUEL 
WILSON,  SAMI-EL  M. 


GENERAL  DIVISIONS. 


PART.  PAOB 

I.  SCIENCE  AND  ART,  -                                       9 

II.  LITERATURE    AND    EDUCATION,  49 

III.  THE  CONDUC;  OF  LIFE,  ...  33 

IV.  RELIGION  AND  THE  FUTURE  LIFE,  -        -  131 
V.  THE  FARM  AND  GARDEN,  -        -         -        157 

VI.  SOCIETY  AND  THE  STATE.  -         -            181 

VII.  FRATERNAL   SOCIETIES,  -        -         -        261 

VIII.  DISTINGUISHED  MEN,  -         -                 -           299 

IX.  CALIFORNIANA,  -        .        .        -       361 

X.  MISCELLANY,               -        -  -        -         .                    391 


PREFACE. 


As  a  labor  of  love,  in  my  leisure  hours,  I  have 
gathered  from  all  parts  of  the  Golden  State  a  varied 
collection  of  precious  gems.  All  of  these  had  sparkled 
for  a  time  in  the  public  eye,  but  the  lapse  of  years  had 
left  most  of  them  hidden  away  between  faded  leaves- 
consigned  to  the  "dust  and  silence  of  the  upper  shelf." 
I  have  brought  them  forth  aijain,  their  luster  still  un- 

£5  <t> 

dimmed,  and  have  given  them  new  setting  in  a  single 
cluster,  writh  the  two-fold  motive  of  securing  their  com 
mon  preservation,  and  enhancing  their  beauty  and  value 
by  making  their  contrasted  colors  emit  intenser  light. 
They  are  distinctively  and  exclusively  Californian.  I 
proffer  them  to  an  appreciative  public.  They  are  the 
jewels  of  others,  only  the  setting  is  mine. 

O.  T.  S. 

San  Francisco,  Aug.  ist,  s<$8a 


I. 

SCIENCE  AND  ART. 


PART    I. 


SCIENCE  AND  ART. 


1.  OH,  SCIENCE!     Thou  thought-clad  leader  of  the 
company  of  pure  and  great  souls  that  toil  for  their  race 
and  love  their  kind  ;    measurer  of  the  depths  of  earth 
and    the    recesses    of   heaven;    apostle   of  civilization, 
handmaid   of  religion,  teacher  of  human  equality  and 
human  right,  perpetual  witness  for  the  divine  wisdom — 
be  ever,  as  now,  the  great  minister  of  peace!     Let  thy 
starry  brow  and  benign  front  still  gleam  in  the  van  of 
progress,  brighter  than  the  sword  of  the  conqueror,  and 
welcome  as  the  light  of  heaven. — Gen.  E.  D.  Baker. 

2.  SCIENCE  DESTROYS  NOT,  BUT  FuLFiLLS.~--The 
end   and  mission  of  science    is  not   only    to  discover 
new    truth,    but    also,    and    even    more    distinctively, 
to  give  new  and  more  rational  form  to  old  truth — to 
transfigure  the  old  into  the  more  glorious  form  of  the 
new.     Science  is  come  not  to  destroy,  but,   aided  by  a 
rational  philosophy,  to  fulfill  all  the  noblest  aspirations, 
the  most  glorious  hopes  of  our  race.     Sometimes,  in 
deed,  the  change  which  she  brings  about  may  be  like  a 
metamorphosis — the  useless  shell  is  burst  and  cast  off  and 
a  more  beautiful  and  less  gross  form  appears,  but  still 


10  CALIFORNIA   ANTHOLOGY. 

it  is  always  a  process  of  evolution — of  derivation.  We 
never  shall  reach  a  rational  philosophy  until  we  recog 
nize  this  fundamental  truth.  The  new  must  include  the 
old,  the  "old  must  incorporate  and  assimilate  the  new, 
and  each  must  modify  and  be  modified  by  the  other. 
Progress  in  all  things — in  geology,  in  society,  in  phi 
losophy — is  by  evolution  and  growth. — Prof.  Joseph 
LeContc. 

3.  SCIENCE  THE  STUDENT  OF  NATURE. — The  writ 
ings  of  the  metaphysicians,  from  the  earliest  dawn  of 
scientific  inquiry,  have  done  much  to  retard  the  pro 
gress  of  the  physical  sciences,  which  were  classified  by 
them  as  belonging  to  an  inferior  sphere  of  intellectual 
pursuits;  and  it  is  not  the  least  merit  of  the  mathema 
ticians  of  the  last  and  present  centuries  to  have  pricked 
that  bubble,  and  by  the  immense  discoveries  to  which 
the  calculus  has  given  rise,  to  have  shown  the  superi 
ority  and  practical  utility  of  their  method.  The  true 
philosophy  of  nature  must  have  nature  for  its  basis,  and 
apply  to  it  the  scientific  discipline.  It  consists  in  ap 
plying  the  reasoning  faculties  of  the  mind  to  the  rational 
conception  of  cause  and  effect  in  the  infinite  variety  of 
natural  phonomena.  Whenever  philosophy  leaves  na 
ture  as  the  object  of  its  inquiries,  when  the  mind  of  the 
philosopher  attempts  to  contemplate  itself  as  an  object, 
independent  of  the  natural  phenomena  which  are  con 
nected  with  and  reflected  from  it,  he  sets  himself  an  im 
possible  task,  and  begins  to  reason  in  a  circle.  The 
conception  of  the  grandeur,  order,  harmony,  and  unity 
of  nature,  whether  it  acts  on  an  infinitely  great,  or  an 
infinitely  small  scale,  is  the  true  end  of  all  human  phi- 


SCIENCE    AND    ART.  11 

losophy,  as  the  knowledge  of  the  laws  of  nature  is  the 
true  means  of  increasing  the  happiness  and  power  of 

the  human  race. — Milton  S.  Latham. 

% 

4.  A  PROGRESS  STEADY  AND  SERENE. — Amid  the 
cyclical  movement  of  society,  the  rise  and  fall  of  nations 
and  civilizations,  the  flux  and  reflux  of  opinions,  the 
revolutions  of  all  kinds,  which  agitate,  like  a  seething 
cauldron,  the  popular  mind,  science  alone — because  it  is 
the  simplest  and  purest  embodiment  of  the  human  in 
tellect,  unaffected  by  the  passions  which  mingle  with  all 
other  pursuits — science  alone,  among  all  human  works, 
moves  steadily  onward  and  upward,  ever  increasing  in 
grandeur  and  beauty.  Like  a  magnificent  temple, 
grandly  and  steadily  it  rises,  under  the  busy  hands  of 
thousands  of  eager  workers,  the  greatest  monument  of 
human  genius. — Prof.  Jos.  LeConte. 

6.  SCIENTIFIC  METHODS. — Scientific  methods  bear 
the  same  relation  to  intellectual  progress  which  ma 
chines,  instruments,  tools,  do  to  material  progress. 
The  civilized  man  is  not  superior  to  the  savage  in 
physical  strength.  The  wonderful  mechanical  results 
achieved  by  civilized  man  are  possible  only  by  the  use 
of  mechanical  contrivances.  So,  also,  the  scientists  dif 
fer  from  the  unscientific  not  by  any  superior  intellec 
tual  power.  The  astounding  intellectual  results 
achieved  by  science  have  been  attained  wholly  by  the 
use  of  intellectual  contrivances,  called  methods.  As  in 
the  lower  sphere  of  material  progress,  the  greatest  bene 
factors  of  our  race  are  the  inventors  or  perfecters  of 
new  mechanical  contrivances  or  machines;  so  in  the 


12  CALIFORNIA    ANTHOLOGY. 

higher  sphere  of  intellectual  progress  the  greatest 
benefactors  of  our  race  are  the  inventors  or  perfecters 
of  new  intellectual  contrivances,  or  methods. — Prof. 
Jos.  LcConte. 

6.  PROCLAIMING  TRUTH,  SCIENCE  ENRICHES  FANCY. 
The  most  casual  observation  is  sufficient  to  convince 
every  reflective  mind  that  in  the  present  century  we 
feel  the  necessity  of  reconciling  the  worlds  of  reason 
and  imagination.  This  reconciliation  cannot  be 
effected  in  a  moment;  it  must  be  the  result  of  repeated 
and  prolonged  efforts.  In  this  work  of  establishing 
harmony  between  these  two  great  faculties  of  the  soul 
it  is  evident  that  science  is  destined  to  play  a  very  im 
portant  part.  Whenever  old  and  deep-rooted  errors 
are  exploded  by  the  increase  of  knowledge,  a  feeling  of 
insecurity  arises  in  the  ill-instructed  multitude.  The 
half-educated  pretender  gladly  embraces  the  opportu 
nity  to  promulgate  his  narrow-minded  views;  doubt, 
scepticism  and  infidelity,  with  regard  to  all  intellectual 
questions,  take  the  place  of  security,  faith  and 
mental  repose.  Hence  arises  that  strange  dread,  pos 
sessed  by  so  many,  of  the  results  of  science;  a  dread 
which  threatens  to  destroy  that  world  which  their  faith 
and  feeling  for  the  beautiful  had  created.  They  are 
thus  consigned  to  a  state  of  vacuity  and  nothingness, 
which  would  indeed  be  lamentable  and  fearful,  were  it 
unavoidable.  The  triumphant  conquests  of  science 
which  give  us  the  purest  pleasure  are,  for  such  unhappy 
beings,  no  less  than  the  dangerous  approaches  of  a  des 
olating  foe.  The  source  of  the  evil  must  be  sought  in 
the  ignorance  of  the  true  principles  of  science  and  in 


SCIENCE    AND    ART.  13 

the  weakness  of  man's  faith  in  the  eternal  and  inde 
structible  nature  of  truth.  When  the  former  ideas  of 
the  physical  universe  are  broken  up,  there  is  a  period 
of  insecurity  and  mistrust,  in  which  even  the  more 
thoughtful  of  men  feel  a  vague  apprehension  that  the 
enlargement  of  the  empire  of  reality  must  necessarily 
contract  the  domains  in  which  the  creative  powers  of 
fancy  delight  to  rove.  It  seems  to  me  that  such  a  view 
is  based  upon  a  misconception  of  the  subject.  For  it 
is  evident  that  each  step  that  we  make  in  the  more  inti 
mate  knowledge  of  science,  leads  us  to  the  threshold 
of  new  labyrinths.  The  circle  of  illumination  is  en 
larged;  but  the  shadowy,  half-transparent,  vapor- veiled 
circumference,  by  which  it  is  perpetually  bordered, 
incessantly  recedes  before  the  eyes  of  the  enquirer,  con 
stituting  a  fairy-land  where  imagination  revels  and 
lends  a  definite  outline  to  the  ever  unfolding  manifesta 
tions  of  ideal  creation.  Thus  it  is,  that  every  acces 
sion  to  the  sciences  enriches  the  fields  of  fancy  by  bring 
ing  new  mysteries  within  their  sphere,  and  opening  to 
them  higher  and  more  soul-elevating  sources  of  enjoy 
ment. — Prof.  John  LeConte. 

7.  TRUTH  THE  GUIDING  STAR  OF  SCIENCE. — So 
far  as  my  observation  goes, — so  far  as  my  intercourse 
with  men  of  scientific  pursuits  teaches  me,  Science  is 
the  embodiment  and  personification  of  peace.  Its  very 
existence  is  the  issue  of  calm  experiment,  persistent  in 
vestigation,  and  deliberate  thought.  It  seeks  no  bub 
ble  reputation  at  the  cannon's  mouth ;  no  ephemeral 
glory  in  the  fierce  conflict  of  politics.  It  is  born,  bred 
and  nurtured  in  the  serene  quietness  of  Nature. 


14  CALIFORNIA    ANTHOLOGY. 

The  devotees  of  Science  are  warriors  only  in  an 
other  sense, — they  dare  be  true,  earnest  and  brave 
in  the  pursuit  of  true  knowledge ;  and  firm,  steadfast, 
and  unyielding  in  maintaining  that  which  is  demon 
strated. 

Men  of  original  research  in  Science  are  in  the  fullest 
sense  of  the  word  Discoverers,  forced  to  traverse  the 
great  ocean  of  illogical  thought  and  imperfect  observa 
tion  ;  and  when  they  reach  the  shores  of  Investigation, 
it  is  an  essential  part  of  their  undertaking  to  burn 
their  ships  of  early  prejudice,  of  traditional  supersti 
tions,  and  of  inconsequent  learning. 

Their  guiding  star  in  all  research,  in  all  deduction,  is 
Truth, — and  Truth  for  Truth's  sake  alone.  The  strug 
gle  for  mastery  over  the  errors  of  the  earlier  educa 
tion  is  intense,  and  can  only  be  fully  understood  by 
those  who  have  conquered.  And  yet  as  new  relations 
in  Nature  are  unfolded,  the  observer  soon  finds  the 
scales  of  defective  teachings  falling  from  his  mental 
vision,  and  he  is  impelled  by  the  very  truthfulness  of 
his  work  to  urge  his  labors,  and  to  gather  into  consecu 
tive  order  the  fruits  of  his  discoveries. 

And  it  must  be  gratifying  to  every  teacher  of  youth, 
and  of  older  age — I  mean  teachers  in  the  broadest 
terms  which  the  word  will  admit — the  preacher,  the 
artist,  the  professor,  the  actor — to  know  how  the  moral 
sense  of  truth  is  enlarged,  intensified,  and  attuned  by. 
the  very  effort  of  investigation  and  deduction.  I  can 
fancy  no  other  occupation  except  that  of  the  mathema 
tician,  that  will,  in  its  workings  alone,  bear  comparison 
with  original  research  in  thus  developing  one  of  the 


SCIENCE    AND    ART.  15 

highest  attributes  of  our  present  condition.  And  the 
spread  of  this  taste  for  examination  is  to  me  the  most 
hopeful  sign  in  an  age  when  charlatans  in  many  profes 
sions  are  endeavoring  to  cut  loose  the  moorings  of  pub- 
Lc  and  private  morals. 

The  history  of  the  Inductive  Sciences  abounds  in 
examples  and  lessons  bearing  pertinently  upon  the  po 
sition  and  relations  of  discovery  with  society  at  large  ; 
and  it  would  appear  pedantic  even  to  mention  the  early 
observers  in  astronomy  and  physics ;  investigators 
whose  advances  were  notedly  marked  by  the  long  and 
persistent  opposition  which  they  encountered.  The 
"  warfare "  was  decidedly  one-sided ;  the  aggressors 
were  assuredly  not  the  investigators  ;  nevertheless,  the 
attacks  of  prejudice,  of  scholastic  dogmatism,  of  unrea 
soning  credulity,  were  powerless  to  stay  the  march  of 
deduced  Truth. 

Almost  in  our  own  time  we  have  had  presented  to 
us  several  remarkable  fields  of  investigation  that  were 
held  and  entrenched  by  the  blindest  faith,  and  nothing 
but  the  unwavering  labor  of  the  investigator  has  drawn 
light  and  truth  from  them. 

With  the  opening  of  the  present  century  there  dawned 
a  new  era  in  Palaeontology;  a  few  clear  minds  had 
caught  its  whisperings,  and  it  has  emerged  a  science. 
The  previous  investigators  had  indeed  been  in  advance 
of  their  times,  but  the  modes  of  independent  thought 
had  not  then  been  fully  developed;  and  moreover,  their 
conclusions  were  warped  and  trammelled  by  the  same 
causes  that  had  so  long  repressed  the  acceptance  of  the 
new  cosmogony.  But  the  clear  truths  of  discovery 


1C  CALIFORNIA  ANTHOLOGY. 

accumulated,  and  of  necessity  the  earlier  education  was 
pushed  aside  whenever  and  wherever  it  stood  in  con 
flict  with  the  deductions  of  the  bolder  thinking.  System 
now  guides  investigation,  and  method  has  constructed 
coherent  and  more  comprehensive  theories.  To-day 
there  is  admitted  no  "sports  of  nature  "  on  the  palaeon- 
tological  record,  but  order,  succession,  and  inevitable 
law.  The  stratigraphical  record  of  the  earth  is  now  read 
as  certainly,  if  not  so  easily,  as  the  hieroglyphics  of 
Egypt,  or  the  cuneiform  inscriptions  of  Assyria. 

It  seemed  almost  seeking  and  courting  the  condem 
nation  of  the  so-called  "  learned  professions  "  when  the 
Archaeologist  first  propounded  the  proofs  of  man's  early 
existence  on  the  face  of  the  earth;  and  yet  the  searchers 
after  truth  have  brought  such  evidences  of  his  presence 
here,  even  before  the  last  glacial  period,  that  only  the 
"  doubting  Thomases  "  can  fail  to  see  the  import  and 
weight  of  their  investigations.  Very  much  more  re 
mains  to  be  done  before  the  "  mint  stamp  "  is  placed 
upon  any  given  archaeological  theory  ;  but  the  stream 
of  evidence  gathers  volume  ,and  momentum,  and  will 
yet  carry  the  law  with  it. 

And  in  the  "  new  chemistry "  is  it  not  remarkable 
what  great  strides  have  been  taken,  and  what  broader 
horizons  have  been  opened  before  us,  in  the  investiga 
tions  and  illustrations  of  "the  Molecular  Theory?" 
The  old  atom  of  our  student  days  still  claims  and  still 
holds  a  qualified  existence,  but  the  wonderful  microcosm 
of  the  "  molecule  "  has  immensely  enlarged  the  views 
of  the  physicist,  and  enabled  him  to  almost  penetrate 
the  arcana  of  ultimate  matter.  The  mathematician 


SCIENCE    AND    ART.  17 

sees  in  it  the  opportunity  for  the  legitimate  application 
of  his  analysis,  and  we  may  rest  assured,  from  the  pres 
ent  progress  in  the  examination,  that  he  will  ultimately 
master  the  problem.  And  curiously  enough,  in  this 
branch  of  science,  the  modern  investigator  has  trodden 
upon  the  domain  of  the  metaphysician,  and  shown  that 
the  infinite  divisibility  of  matter  is  a  phantasm  of 
the  brain  of  the  closet  philosopher ;  for  the  atom  and 
the  molecule  have  their  sizes  determinable.  By  direct 
experiment,  also,  the  chemist  has  placed  three  distinct 
bodies  of  the  same  volume  in  the  space  occupied  by 
one  of  them ;  and  again  confounded  the  "  inner  con 
sciousness"  of  the  metaphysical  dreamer. 

In  the  rich  field  of  Zoology  and  Biology,  we  have 
found,  and  we  may  reasonably  expect  to  find,  more  of 
the  highest  developments  in  the'  law  of  evolution,  for 
the  very  essence  and  integrity  of  the  law,  in  one  of  its 
more  important  phases,  is  ever-present  within  our 
means  of  investigation.  It  is  comparatively  young 
among  the  modern  sciences,  and  yet  its  deductions 
point  unerringly  to  the  same  pole  in  the  heavens  of 
true  knowledge. 

For  these  sciences,  and  for  all  the  others,  the  specialist 
must  be  peculiarly  gifted  for  research ;  his  education 
develops  as  he  advances;  and  his  deductions  are  founded 
only  upon  the  sequence  and  coherence  of  observed  facts. 
All  the  streams  of  knowledge  will  flow  into  the  same 
great  channel  and  homologate.  We  may  not  imagine 
that  channel  banks-full  until  our  race  reaches  a  higher 
development ;  we  may  not  hear  the  announcement  of 
the  grand  formula  of  evolution,  but  we  experience,  the 

<Q 


18  CALIFORNIA   ANTHOLOGY. 

lively  satisfaction  of  the  ancient  geometer,  and  know 
that  we  are  on  the  right  line  of  research  and  deduction 
towards  it.  And  yet  in  our  hopefulness  and  trustful 
ness  of  the  very  evolution  of  law  in  the  cosmos,  we  feel 
that  at  any  day  may  arise  the  man  and  the  brain  to 
grasp  and  announce  the  intimate  relations  of  all  matter 
and  of  all  forces. 

These  views  are  not  confined  to  the  scientist ;  you 
know  that,  in  one  shape  or  another,  they  are  permeat 
ing  the  earth.  The  war-cries  of  dogmatism,  of  imper 
fect  education,  of  unquestioning  faith,  may  be  raised 
against  them,  but  the  world  "  still  moves." 

The  discovery  of  America  was  an  epoch  of  restless 
inquiry,  and  opened  a  fresh  field  for  growth  and  culti 
vation  of  free  thought  and  free  deductions  ;  the  activity 
of  the  last  century  has  wonderfully  accelerated  their 
exposition  ;  and  to-day  our  children  are  starting  where 
we  are  leaving  off. 

To  every  teacher  of  youth,  to  every  adviser  of  rha- 
turer  age  and  thought,  the  newer  education  must  come 
in  direct  conflict  with  part  of  their  earlier  and  more 
contracted  education  ;  and  they  must  abandon  the  dicta 
of  mere  "  schools "  and  teach  these  higher  laws  of 
science,  or  be  dragged  at  the  wheels  of  irresistible  men 
tal  and  moral  progress. — Prof.  Gco.  Davidson. 

8.  SCIENCE  KNOWS  NOT  PREJUDICE  OR  PASSION. — It 
is  the  felicity  of  the  scientific  man,  that  the  truth  he  seeks 
is  cosmopolitan.  It  knows  not  state  or  nation,  tribe  or 
race,  but  is  world-truth  and  world-law.  The  distin 
guished  representatives  of  that  truth  have  a  clear  at- 


.     SCIENCE    AND    ART.  19 

mosphere,  and  if  their  moral  nature  is  strong  enough 
to  sustain  itself  in  those  rarined  heights,  they  lead  a 
life  of  singular  dignity  and  freedom,  their  minds  dashed 
with  no  color  of  prejudice  or  passion — seeking  what  is. 
To  know  what  is  in  the  world  of  things,  is  the  vgcation 
of  the  man  of  science.  His  reputation  is  the  reputa 
tion  of  truth,  strong  and  still  as  the  sun ;  and  his  name 
is  the  property  of  mankind. — Rev.  Horatio  Stcbbins. 

9.  THE  EVOLUTION  OF  SCIENCE  AND  ART. — This 
age  is  one  of  science,  as  contra-distinguished  from  the 
ages  of  poetry,  the  arts,  conquest  and  superstition. 

The  Greeks,  who  are  our  masters,  and  the  masters 
of  all  the  succeeding  ages  in  all  that  relates  to  sculp 
ture,  poetry,  taste,  refinement  of  thought  and  feelingi 
rhetoric,  logic,  eloquence  and  ideal  philosophy,  were 
yet  children  in  the  natural  sciences,  though  they  were 
far  from  being  deficient  in  certain  branches  of  mathe 
matics  and  were  accurate  observers  of  men  and  things. 

There  is  not  a  principle  in  abstract  logic  which  was 
not  as  well  understood  by  Aristotle  as  it  now  is  by  the 
most  eminent  in  Europe  or  America,  and  no  abstract 
principle  of  moral  philosophy  which  the  Greeks  did  not 
elaborate,  refine,  and  adorn  with  the  elegance  and  grace 
of  their  language,  and  their  peculiar  adoration  of  the 
sublime  and  beautiful. 

But  their  artistic  taste,  and  the  ideality  of  their  con 
ceptions,  rendered  them  far  more  apt  to  speculate  on 
the  natural  sciences  and  to  establish  beautiful  theories, 
than  to  go  through  the  painful  process  of  methodical 
investigation,  aided  by  actual  experiments. 


20  CALIFORNIA   ANTHOLOGY. 

They  were  most  accurate  observers  of  nature,  as  far 
as  the  latter  is  revealed  to  the  senses,  and  they  pos 
sessed  a  wonderful  combination  of  thought,  and  reason 
ing  to  draw  conclusions  and  to  build  up  systems ;  but 
where  their  senses  erred  they  necessarily  arrived  at 
wrong  conclusions;  and  they  had  no  means  of  following 
nature  into  her  dark  chambers  of  inquisition,  putting 
questions  to  her,  compelling  answers  and  racking  the 
truth  from  her  by  means  of  philosophical  apparatus. 
They  had  no  telescope,  no  microscope,  no  physical  in 
struments  or  chemical  laboratories  of  any  importance, 
and  the  mechanical  arts  were  not  sufficiently  advanced 
to  furnish  either. 

The  heroes  of  the  Iliad  knew  neither  iron  nor  steel ; 
they  fought  their  battles  with  arms  made  of  copper,  and 
the  accomplished  Aspasia,  though  decked  with  gems  of 
art  which  our  modern  cameo  cutters  would  vainly  imi 
tate,  knew  neither  gauze,  silk,  nor  muslin. 

Considering  the  limited  means  of  observation  and 
construction  possessed  by  the  Greeks,  they  achieved 
wonders  in  the  correct  classification  of  phenomena  and 
their  accurate  description  of  them,  and  in  the  acuteness 
of  the  process  of  reasoning  brought  to  bear  upon  them. 

But  they  had  not  data  enough  to  reason  from,  though 
they  had  in  many  instances  a  presentiment  of  truth 
amounting  almost  to  intuition.  And  to  their  ever 
lasting  honor  be  it  spoken,  they  sought  truth,  merely 
for  the  sake  of  truth,  on  account  of  its  divine  essence 
and  ennobling  character. 

There  was  no  stimulus  given  to  inventors  and  dis 
coverers  in  the  shape  of  patents  and  privileges  for  the 


SCIENCE    AND    ART.  21 

accumulation  of  large  fortunes ;  and  the  answer  given 
by  Archimedes  to  his  pupil  who  wished  to  devote  him 
self  to  the  divine  science  of  mathematics,  because  its 
application  had  saved  the  state,  furnishes  a  powerful 
contrast  to  the  sordid  motives  which  but  too  often  gov 
ern  our  modern  votaries  of  science. 

"  Science  was  divine,"  replied  Archimedes,  "  before  it 
served  the  state,  and  he  who  only  worships  her  on  ac 
count  of  the  uses  to  which  she  may  be  put,  desecrates 
her  shrine."  Yet  even  Archimedes,  with  his  knowledge 

o 

of  geometry,  mechanics  and  hydraulics,  would  now  be 
scarcely  able  to  pass  an  examination  for  admission  into 
the  Polytechnic  School  of  Paris,  or  rank  with  an  under 
graduate  of  the  Military  Academy  of  West  Point. 

The  Romans,  at  the  period  of  their  Greek  conquest, 
were  a  semi-barbarous  people,  but  naturally  possessed 
of  great  aptitudes.  They  soon  perceived  and  imitated 
the  superior  civilization  and  refinement  of  the  Greeks, 
and  as  Pliny  expressed  it  in  one  of  his  letters,  "  were 
in  turn  subdued  and  conquered  by  the  vanquished." 

But  the  Romans  never  equaled  the  Greeks  in  the 
fine  arts ;  neither  did  they  materially  add  to  Greek 
science. 

They  were  essentially  a  military  people,  who  looked 
upon  themselves  as  the  masters  of  the  world,  and  upon 
the  rest  of  mankind  as  tributary  to  their  greatness.  To 
carry  out  this  view  required  not  only  great  valor  (virtus 
it  was  called)  and  grea"t  generalship,  but  also  fixed  prin 
ciples  of  policy  in  regard  to  their  neighbors  and  the 
peoples  subjected  to  their  rule.  The  Romans  culti 
vated  statesmanship,  and  felt  at  an  early  period  the 


22  CALIFORNIA  ANTHOLOGY. 

necessity  of  law.  The  relations  of  property  called  for 
the  exercise  of  legislative  wisdom,  and  led  to  the  en 
actment  of  codes  which  have  become  models  of  legal 
reasoning  to  all  subsequent  legislators. 

The  code  of  Justinian  is  still  in  force  in  many  coun 
tries  in  Europe,  and  Roman  law,  as  an  introduction  to 
the  study  of  all  other  law,  is  required  in  most  Euro 
pean  Universities.  No  nation  has  elaborated  the  spirit 
or  science  of  law  more  fully  than  the  Romans,  and  if 
the  legislators  of  England  and  France  have  found  it 
expedient  to  vary  from  it  in  one  or  the  other  respect,  it 
was  done  simply  with  a  view  of  meeting  the  altered 
state  of  society,  and  the  new  relations  of  property  aris 
ing  from  new  modes  of  acquisition.  Leibnitz,  the 
great  mathematician  and  logician,  compared  the  study 
of  the  Roman  law  to  a  course  of  mathematics,  so  vig 
orous  did  he  find  its  process  of  reasoning,  its  logical 
deductions,  and  its  demonstrative  justice.  Our  com 
mon  law  derived  from  England  is  undoubtedly  better 
adapted  to  the  wants  of  a  free  and  simple  hearted  peo 
ple,  for  the  common  law  is  a  school  of  freedom,  a  bul 
wark  against  tyranny  ;  but  no  law  has,  like  the  Roman, 
so  entirely  met  the  requirements  of  abstract  justice. 

Greeks  and  Romans  then  were  our  masters.  Greek 
philosophy  and  art,  and  Roman  law  and  statesmanship, 
have  assisted  in  shaping  our  present  civilization.  But 
Greek  philosophy  had  to  be  stripped  of  its  poetical 
dress,  and  to  Roman  law  had  to  "be  added  the  chapter 
on  inalienable  human  rights  and  the  duties  of  nations 
toward  each  otlicr,  to  prepare  the  further  development 
of  the  intellectual  and  moral  faculties  of  man.  The 


SCIENCE   AND    ART.  23 

Romans  had  no  idea  of  international  law;  no  suspicion 
that  a  conquered  nation  had  any  rights  at  all,  or  that 
Rome  had  any  obligation  to  a  foreign  nation,  except 
those  which  were  dictated  by  her  own  interests.  Her 
conduct  toward  neutral  powers  and  toward  the  con 
quered,  were  alike  the  result  of  policy. 

Some  ot  the  Greek  philosophers — among  others, 
Socrates,  in  his  dialogues — had  much  higher  conceptions 
of  the  mutual  duties  and  obligations  of  men  and  peo 
ples  ;  but  they  never  succeeded  in  having  their  views 
adopted,  as  a  principle  of  action,  either  state  or 
individual.  In  this  respect  our  civilization  and  learning 
are  far  in  advance  of  the  ancients,  and  far  more  in 
harmony  with  the  general  laws  of  nature.  We  have 
evidently  advanced  in  knowledge,  though  we  may 
remain  far  behind  the  Greeks,  not  only  in  performance, 
but  also  in  the  appreciation  of  the  fine  arts.  We  have 
no  reason  to  regret  this  deterioration  in  one  respect, 
and  advance  in  another ;  for,  in  spite  of  the  fostering 
care  bestowed  by  legislation  on  science  and  art,  there 
is  a  certain  antagonism  between  them  distinctly  marked 
in  ihe  history  of  each  nation. 

The  inspirations  of  the  artist  consist  in  an  intuitive 
perception  of  truth,  and  in  an  undefined,  but  neverthe 
less  entire  appreciation  of  the  harmony  of  all  created 
things.  Imagination  must  of  course  elaborate  each 
individual  conception  of  the  artist ;  but  it  must  always 
be  in  harmony  with  nature,  or,  to  use  a  more  familiar 
phrase,  it  must  be  "  true  to  nature."  The  process  of 
science  is  the  reverse.  Here  nothing  is  intuition  ;  all 
is  either  analysis  or  synthetic  reasoning  from  cause  to 


24  CALIFORNIA   ANTHOLOGY. 

effect.  Both  processes  are  gradual,  and  necessarily 
exclude  the  influence  of  the  imagination.  In  the  artist, 
union  of  design  is  the  first  essential  pre-requisite ;  in 
science,  union  is  the  result  of  many  truths  combined 
into  one  after  a  long  process  of  reasoning.  The  exclu 
sion  of  the  imagination  from  scientific  pursuits  pre 
cludes  artistic  conception  and  vice  versa. 

The  arts  have  preceded  science  all  over  the  world, 
as  poetry  was  written  before  prose.  Men  felt  truth 
before  they  were  conscious  of  it,  as  a  child  learns  to 
speak  before  it  studies  grammar,  or  as  a  mind  may  be 
logical  without  having  paid  much  attention  to  catego 
ries.  Science  consists  in  conscious  truth, — in  truth 
demonstrated.  It  is  this  latter  perception  of  truth 
which  gives  man  power  over  matter,  which  teaches  him 
his  moral  and  physical  status  in  the  universe,  and 
brings  him  in  contact  with  the  infinite.  Greek  and 
Roman  art  flourished  without  rigorous  perceptions  of 
scientfiic  truths,  and  painting  and  statuary  reached  the 
highest  perfection  of  art  in  the  fifteenth  and  sixteenth 
centuries,  amidst  grotesque  superstitions,  which,  not 
withstanding  the  great  discoveries  of  that  period,  in 
more  than  one  respect  checked  the  progress  of  scientific 
pursuits. 

The  first  impulse  to  the  logical  pursuit  of  science 
was  given  by  Bacon.  Not  that  he  established  any 
particular  theory  or  hypothesis  of  his  own,  but  because 
he  upset  all  those  which  had  hitherto  been  established, 
and  which  had  prevented  all  real  scientific  progress. 
He  is  the  founder  of  experimental  philosophy;  that  is, 
the  knowledge  of  nature  arising  from  certain  proofs 


SCIENCE   AND   ART.  25 

furnished  by  nature  herself  when  subjected  to  certain 
tests.  Philosophers  had  ever  after  to  deal  in  facts,  not 
in  theories ;  and  when  these  facts  were  not  obvious  to 
the  senses,  they  had  to  be  illustrated  by  actual  experi 
ments. 

Experience,  not  ingenious  conjecture,  was  henceforth 
to  guide  the  explorer  of  nature  and  her  laws.  The 
metamorphosis  wrought  by  this  change  of  system  in 
the  mode  of  reasoning  on  natural  subjects,  changed 
Astrology  into  Astronomy,  Alchemy  into  Chemistry, 
and  the  search  after  the  Philosopher's  Stone  into  Min 
eralogy  and  Geology.  It  has  added  many  new 
branches  to  science,  branches  for  which  even  the  names 
were  wanting  in  former  ages,  and  which  have  since  led 
the  way  to  the  most  important  inventions,  changed 
the  form  and  aspect  of  the  civilized  world.  And  it  has 
also  shown  to  us  that  all  natural  sciences  are  intimately 
connected  with  each  other  ;  that  there  is,  in  fact,  but 
one  great  science — that  of  nature — and  that  all  the  sci 
ences  men  have  cultivated  from  time  to  time,  in  differ 
ent  ages,  are  but  so  many  fractional  parts  of  that  uni 
versal  unit. — Milton  S.  Latham. 

1O.  THE  MASTERBUILDERS  IN  THE  TEMPLE  OF 
SCIENCE. — In  the  noble  army  of  Science — that  army 
so  compactly  organized  for  the  conquest  of  darkness 
and  the  extension  of  the  empire  of  light — there  are 
many  valiant  fighters,  but  there  can  be  but  few  leaders. 
In  the  construction  of  the  great  temple  of  science— 
that  eternal  temple  made  without  hands — the  only  tem 
ple  ever  erected  by  man  worthy  to  be  dedicated  to  the 


26  CALIFORNIA   ANTHOLOGY. 

great  Author  of  Nature — there  are  many  busy,  eagerr 
joyous  workmen,  but  there  can  be  but  few  master- 
builders. 

As  we  look  back  over  the  history  of  science,  we  see, 
at  long  intervals,  certain  men  who  seem  to  tower  far 
above  their  fellows.  In  what  consists  their  greatness  ? 
They  are  men  who  have  introduced  great  ideas  or  new 
methods  into  science — ideas  which  extend  the  domain 
of  human  thought,  or  methods  which  increase  our 
power  over  nature,  facilitate  the  progress  of  discovery, 
and  thus  open  the  way  to  the  conquest  of  new  fields. 
Such  men  were  Copernicus,  and  Galileo,  and  Kepler, 
and  Newton,  and  Herschel,  in  astronomy ;  such  were 
Linnaeus,  and  Buffon,  and  Cuvier  and  Agassiz,  in  or 
ganic  science. — Prof.  Joseph  LeConte. 

11.  EVOLUTION  AND  MATERIALISM. — It  is  believed 
by  many  that  science  starves  all  our  noblest  faculties, 
quenches  all  our  most  glorious  aspirations,  and  buries 
all  our  heavenly  hopes  in  the  cold  earth  of  a  vulgar 
materialism. 

Now,  it  is  indeed  true,  that  there  has  been  in  these 
modern  times  a  strong  tendency,  a  current  of  thought,  ia 
the  direction  of  materialism.  It  is  true,  too,  that  this 
tendency  is  strongest  in  the  domain  of  science,  and 
among  sciences,  strongest  of  all,  in  biology  and  geology; 
but  I  believe  it  is  true,  also,  that  this  is  only  a  passing 
phase  of  thought,  an  ephemeral  fashion  of  philosophy. 
As  a  sympathizer  with  the  age  in  which  I  live,  still 
more  as  a  scientist,  and  most  of  all  as  a  biologist  and 
geologist,  I  have  felt  the  full  force  of  this  tendency. 


SCIENCE    AND    ART.  27 

In  this  stream  of  tendency  I  have  stood,  during  all  my 
active  life,  just  where  the  current  ran  swiftest,  and  con 
fess  to  you  that  I  have  been  sometimes  almost  swept 
off  my  feet.  But  it  is  the  duty  of  every  independent 
thinker  not  to  yield  blindly  to  the  spirit  of  the  age,  but 
to  exercise  his  own  unprejudiced  reason  ;  not  to  float 
and  drift,  but  to  stand. 

I  wish  frankly  to  acknowledge  that  I  am  myself  an 
evolutionist.  I  may  not  agree  with  most  that  evolu 
tion  advances  always  cunt  csquo  pede.  On  the  contrary, 
I  believe  that  there  have  been  periods  of  slow  and 
periods  of  rapid,  almost  paroxysmal,  evolution.  I  may 
not  agree  with  most  that  we  already  have  in  Darwinism, 
the  final  form,  and  in  survival  of  the  fittest,  the  prime 
factor  of  evolution.  On  the  contrary,  I  believe  that 
the  most  important  factors  of  evolution  are  still  un 
known — that  there  are  more  and  greater  factors  in 
evolution  than  are  dreamed  of  in  the  Darwinian  phi 
losophy.  Nevertheless,  evolution  is  a  grand  fact, 
involving  alike  every  department  of  nature  ;  and  more 
especially  evolution  of  the  organic  kingdom  and  the 
origin  of  species  by  derivation,  must  be  regarded  as  an 
established  truth  of  science.  But  remember,  evolution 
is  one  'thing  and  materialism  another  and  quite  a  differ 
ent  thing.  The  one  is  a  sure  result  of  science ;  the 
other  a  doubtful  inference  of  philosophy.  Let  no  one 
who  is  led  step  by  step  through  the  paths  of  evolution, 
from  the  mineral  to  the  organic,  from  the  organic  to  the 
animate,  and  from  the  animate  to  the  rational,  until  he 
lands  logically,  as  he  supposes,  into  blank  and  universal 
materialism ;  let  no  such  one,  I  say,  imagine  for  a 


28  CALIFORNIA  ANTHOLOGY. 

moment  that  he  has  been  walking  all  the  way  in  the 
domain  of  science.  He  has  stepped  across  the  boundary 
of  science  into  the  domain  of  philosophy.  Yet  the  step 
seems  so  easy,  so  natural,  so  inevitable,  that  most  do 
not  distinguish  between  the  teachings  of  science  and 
the  inference  of  philosophy,  and  thus  the  whole  is 
unjustly  accredited  to  science. — Prof.  Jos.  LcConte. 

12.  EVOLUTION  THE  GRANDEST  IDEA  OF  MODERN 
SCIENCE. — Evolution  is  certainly  the  grandest  idea  of 
modern  science,  embracing  alike  every  department  of 
nature.  The  law  of  evolution  is  as  universal  as  the 
law  of  gravitation.  The  one  is  the  universal  law  of 
time,  as  the  other  is  of  space.  In  its  widest  and  truest 
sense,  evolution  constitutes  the  subject  matter  of  at 
least  one-half  of  all  science. 

Now,  in  this  wide  sense,  there  can  be  no  doubt  of 
the  evolution  of  the  organic  kingdom.  There  may  be, 
and  in  fact  there  is,  much  difference  of  opinion  as  to 
the  causes  or  factors  of  evolution — there  may  be,  and 
in  fact  there  is,  much  difference  of  opinion  as  to  the 
rate  of  evolution,  whether  always  uniform  or  often  more 
or  less  paroxysmal ;  but  of  the  fact  of  progressive 
movement  of  the  whole  organic  kingdom  to  higher  and 
higher  conditions,  and  that  the  laws  of  the  progressive 
movement  are  similar  to  those  which  determine  the 
movement  in  all  evolution,  there  is  no  longer  any  doubt. 
These  formal  laws  of  continuous  movement — <?.  g.,  the 
law  of  differentiation,  the  law  of  progress,  etc. — these 
are  the  really  grand  things  about  the  evolution  theory, 
and  for  these  we  are  indebted  to  Agassiz.  Yes,  Agassiz, 


SCIENCE   AND    ART.  29> 

although  he,  to  his  latest  utterances,  contested  modern 
views,  was  himself  the  great  founder  and  apostle  of 
evolution.  All  the  laws  of  the  evolution  of  the  organic 
kingdom,  as  now  recognized,  were  announced  by  him. 
His  whole  life  and  strength  were  devoted  to  enforcing 
and  illustrating  these  laws,  although  he  denied  the  exist 
ence  of  any  discoverable  cause  except  the  Great  First 
Cause.  To  him  the  organic  kingdom  seemed  a  great 
work  of  art,  wrought  out  through  inconceivable  time 
to  higher  and  more  perfect  conditions,  according  to  a. 
plan  predetermined  in  the  mind  of  God ;  and  he  was, 
undoubtedly  right.  Darwin,  on  the  other  hand,  at 
tempted  to  discover  the  secondary  causes  by  means  of 
which  this  marvellous  result  was  attained.  To  him 
the  organic  kingdom,  as  a  whole,  was  a  great  and 
complex  organism  developing  under  the  operation  of 
resident  forces;  and  he  also,  as  I  conceive,  was  right. 
Agassiz  announced  2&\.  formal  laws  of  the  universe  of 
time  as  Kepler  did  those  of  the  universe  of  space ;  he 
was  the  legislator  of  the  dark  abyss  behind  us,  as 
Kepler  was  of  the  overarching  abyss  above  us. — Prof. 
Jos.  LcConte. 

13.  EVOLUTION  NOT  UNGODLY. — There  are  three 
corresponding  views  in  regard  to  the  origin  of  the 
individual,— of  you,  of  me,  of  each  of  us.  The  first  is 
that  of  the  little  innocent,  who  thinks  God  made  him 
as  he  (the  little  innocent)  makes  dirt-pies\  the  second 
is  that  of  the  little  hoodlum,  who  says,  "  I  wasn't  made 
at  all,  I  growed  ; "  the  third  is  the  usual  adult  belief — 
that  we  are  made  by  a  process  of  evolution.  Do  you 


30  CALIFORNIA   ANTHOLOGY. 

not  observe,  then,  that  in  the  matter  of  the  origin  of 
species,  many  good  theologians  and  pietists  are  in  the 
position  of  the  little  innocent  ?  They  think  that 
species  were  made  without  natural  process.  On  the 
other  hand,  most  evolutionists  are  in  the  position  of  the 
little  hoodlum  ;  for  they  think  that  species,  because  they 
"growcd"  wererit  made  at  alL  But  there  is  a  higher 
and  more  rational  philosophy  than  either,  which  holds 
that  the  ideas  of  making  and  of  growing  are  not  incon 
sistent  with  each  other — that  evolution  does  not  and 
cannot  destroy  the  conception  of,  or  the  belief  in,  an 
intelligent  Creator  and  Author  of  the  Cosmos.  This 
view  combines  and  reconciles  the  two  preceding  antag 
onistic  views,  and  is  therefore  more  comprehensive, 
more  rational,  and  more  true.  But  let  us  not  fail  to  do 
justice — let  us  not  overlook  the  fact  that  the  most 
important  and  noblest  truths  are  overlooked  only  by 
the  hoodlum  and  materialist.  Of  the  two  sides  of  the 
shield,  the  little  innocent  and  the  pietist  sees,  at  least, 
the  whiter  and  more  beautiful. — Prof.  Jos.  LeConte. 

14.  SCIENCE  AND  ART  OMNIPOTENT. — Science  and 
Art  flourish  best  in  a  Republican  soil.  Their  achieve 
ments  are  of  no  hot  house  growth.  Where  the  human 
mind  is  left  free  to  grapple  with  Nature;  the  contest  is 
unequal.  The  intrepid  Franklin  grasped  the  motive 
power  of  the  Universe.  Morse,  the  artist-philosopher, 
tamed  and  subdued  it  into  obedience,  and  endowed  it 
with  thought  and  speech.  Swift  as  the  flash  of  God's 
eye,  and  in  mysterious  silence,  the  thought  of  one 
hemisphere  is  uttered  in  the  other.  The  events  of 


SCIENCE    AND    ART.  31 

to-day  are  matters  of  history  to-morrow.  Space  is 
annihilated,  and  time  is  no  more.  The  intensity  and 
activity  of  our  existence  are  truly  appalling.  Omnipo 
tence,  a  grand  and  fearful  attribute  of  Deity,  has  been 
usurped  by  man.  The  elements  are  subjected  to  his 
will,  and  perform  the  most  menial  services.  The  winds 
and  waves  are  set  at  defiance,  and  commerce  and 
humanity  rejoice  at  the  achievements  of  steam.  Labor, 
the  great  element  of  Democracy,  has  been  elevated  to 
a  Science,  and  its  light  illuminates  the  workshops  of 
the  world.  The  hand  of  invention  strikes  the  shackle 
from  toiling  millions. — John  V.  Wattson. 

15.  GREAT  IDEAS  IN  SCIENCE. — Let  me  illustrate 
the  effect  of  the  introduction  of  great  ideas  into  science. 
I  will  select  one  example  from  astronomy,  and  one  from 
geology. 

Before  the  time  of  Copernicus  and  Galileo,  this,  our 
earth,  was  all  of  space  for  us.  Sun,  moon,  and  stars 
were  but  little  satellites  revolving  about  us  at  incon 
siderable  distances.  Astronomy  then  was  but  the  geome 
try  of  the  heavens,  the  geometry  of  the  curious  lines 
traced  by  these  wandering  fires  on  the  concave  of 
heaven.  But  with  the  first  glance  through  the  telescope, 
the  phases  of  Venus  and  the  satellites  of  Jupiter  re 
vealed  the  existence  of  other  worlds  beside  our  own. 
In  that  moment  the  fundamental  idea  of  modern  as 
tronomy,  the  idea  of  infinite  space  filled  with  worlds 
like  our  own,  was  fully  born  in  the  mind  of  Galileo.  In 
that  moment  the  intellectual  vision  of  man  was  infinitely 
extended. 


32  CALIFORNIA   ANTHOLOGY. 

Again,  before  the  time  of  Buffon  and  Cuvier,  this, 
our  human  epoch,  the  history  of  our  race,  was  all  of 
time  for  us.  Shells  and  other  remains  of  marine  animals 
had,  indeed,  been  found  far  in  the  interior  of  the  conti 
nents,  and  high  up  the  slopes  of  mountains,  and  there 
had  been  much  speculation  as  to  their  origin.  Some 
may  have  thought  by  means  of  these  to  extend  the 
limits  of  our  epoch,  but  none  dreamed  of  other  epochs. 
Some  may  have  thought  they  were  discovering  newcoast 
islands  along  the  shores,  but  none  dreamed  that  these 
»were  the  evidences  of  new  worlds  in  the  infinite  abyss 
of  time.  It  was  reserved  for  Buffon  and  Cuvier  first 
to  recognize  the  entire  difference  between  fossil  and 
living  species.  In  that  moment  was  born  the  funda 
mental  idea  of  geology,  the  idea  of  infinite  time  con 
taining  many  successive  epochs,  or  time-worlds  like  our 
own.  In  that  moment  the  intellectual  horizon  of  man 
was  again  infinitely  extended. 

These  two  are  the  grandest  moments  in  the  history 
of  science;  yea,  in  the  intellectual  history  of  our  race. 
The  one  opened  the  gates  of  infinite  space,  and  showed 
us  many  space  worlds;  the  other  opened  up  the  gates 
of  infinite  time,  and  showed  us  as  many  successive 
creations  or  time-worlds. 

We  see,  then,  the  intellectual  impulse  communicated 
by  a  great  new  idea. — Prof.  Jos.  LeConte. 

16.  O,  SCIENCE  !  high-priest  of  truth,  interpreter  of 
nature,  explorer  of  the  infinite !  unto  whom  it  is  given 
to  walk  upon  the  waters  of  the  deep,  to  tread  the 
ocean's  bed,  to  pass  through  furnaces  of  fire,  to  kiss 


SCIENCE    AND    ART.  33 

the  burning  lips  of  the  crater,  to  play  with  the  thunder 
bolts  of  heaven,  and  to  cleave  thy  bright  way  among 
the  everlasting  stars !  We  greet  thee  as  the  sovereign 
genius  of  a  wide  and  widening  realm.  Pursue  thy 
glorious  march  of  conquest,  multiply  thy  triumphs  and 
enlarge  thy  dominion,  giving  to  humanity  thy  garnered 
fruits,  and  ever  leading  us  to  higher  planes  of  knowl 
edge.  So  may  we  keep  in  harmony  with  God's  will. — 
Oscar  T.  Shuck. 

17.  CHEMISTRY,  youngest  daughter  of  the  Sciences, 
born   amidst  flame,  and  cradled  in  billows  of  fire! — 
W.  H.  Rhodes. 

18.  THE   GREAT   SCIENTIFIC    EXPLORER. — In  the 
darkness  of  the  night,  from  his  vessel's  prow,  Colum 
bus  saw    waving    lights    in    front   of   him,    which    the 
dawn    of   morn   showed    him    to    come    from    regions 
new  and  undiscovered,  but   which  had    been  so  near 
him   in   the   night,   that  he  had  scented   the  perfume 
of  the  trees  and  flowers.      And  so   I   doubt  not  the 
eager  searcher  for  truth,  the  Columbus  of  Science,  has 
often    seen  in  the  darkness  of  this    life,    glimmering 
lights  from  the  other  world — lights  which  the  morning 
of  immortality   has   revealed  to  him  as  coming  from 
regions  which  had  been  so  near  to  him  in  the  night  of 
life,  that  even  then  a  little  more  light,  a  little  more  range 
of  organs,  would  have  discovered  them.      It  has  often 
seemed  to  me  that  the  great  scientific  man,  after  death, 
must  have  started  to  find  how  near  he  was,  when  in 
this  world,    to  the  discovery    of  the  whole  secret  of 
being.     Often  I  have  imagined  such  a  one  saying  to 

o 


34  CALIFORNIA  ANTHOLOGY. 

himself :  "  Why,  this  great  truth  was  hidden  in  facts 
long  familiar  to  me  in  my  studies  on  earth.  This  great 
mechanism,  every  spring  of  which  I  now  comprehend, 
simple  as  is  all  the  mechanism  of  God,  needed  but  one 
more  generalization  ;  one  more  syllogism  ;  one  more 
bold  effort  of  the  reason,  and  I  had  found  it  out,  even 
with  the  dull  organs  of  mortality. — John  B.  Felton. 

19.    The  winds  of  heaven  trample  down  the  pines, 
Or  creep  in  lazy  tides  along  the  lea; 

Leap  the  wild  waters  from  the  smitten  rock, 
Or  crawl  with  childish  babble  to  the  sea; 

But  why  the  tempests  out  of  heaven  blow, 
Or  what  the  purpose  of  the  seaward  flow, 

No  man  hath  known,  and  none  shall  ever  know. 

Why  seek  to  know  ?     To  follow  Nature  up 
Against  the  current  to  her  source,  why  care  ? 

Vain  is  the  toil;  he's  wisest  still  who  knows 
All  science  is  but  formulated  prayer — 

Prayer  for  the  warm  winds  and  the  quickening  rain, 
Prayer  for  sharp  sickle  and  for  laboring  wain, 

To  gather  from  the  planted  past  the  grain.— 

A.   G.  Bierce. 

2O.  No  ANTAGONISM  BETWEEN  SCIENCE  AND  RE 
LIGION. — I  am  ready  to  say  and  boldly  maintain  that 
there  is  not,  and  cannot  be,  any  real  antagonism  or 
controversy  between  true  science  and  true  religion. 
All  truth  is  of  God,  and  is  a  unit.  Science  and  religion 
are  twin  sisters  from  the  throne  of  the  Eternal  Law 
giver.  There  is  no  real  controversy  between  them— 


SCIENCE    AND    ART.  35 

no  strife  but  as  to  which  branch  of  knowledge  can  do 
most  for  mankind.  Properly  interpreted,  they  come 
from  the  same  glorious  hand  and  tend  to  the  same 
result — the  "happiness  of  mankind  and  the  glory  of  the 
Creator.  I  honor  science,  and  heartily  bid  God-speed 
to  every  honest  investigator  of  the  laws  of  the  universe. 
As  a  theologian,  I  have  never  had  the  slightest  fear 
concerning  the  advance  of  true  science.  Our  natural 
philosophers  cannot  travel  so  far,  but  they  will  find  the 
Creator  has  been  there  before  them ;  and  as  they  climb 
through  space  and  journey  among  planets  and  systems 
unnumbered,  they  will  all  find  that  the  ladder  by  which 
they  have  ascended  to  the  very  outposts  of  the  universe 
was  built  for  them  by  the  hand  of  an  all-wise  Law 
giver,  possessed  of  supreme  intelligence,  will,  and 
power. — Rev.  Dr.  W.  A.  Scott. 

21.  ESSENTIALLY  there  is  no  conflict  between  re 
ligion  and  science,  and  never  can  be.     Their  boundaries 
are  undefined,  as  the  boundaries  between  the  known  and 
the  unknown,  the  apprehended  and  the  comprehended, 
always  will  be. — Rev.  Horatio  Stebbins. 

22.  Fine  art  has  an  ideal  which  it  seeks  to  embody. 
Morphology  also  has  an  ideal  (the  archetype)  which  it 
seeks  to  discover.     The  ideal  of  art  is  that  toward  which 
all  nature  ceaselessly  strives, — the  ideal  of  science,  that 
from  which  all  nature  is  ceaselessly  unfolded.      Both 
must  ever  remain  ideals  at  an  infinite  distance  from  us. 
We  must  forever  approach,  but  can  never  attain  them. 
For  the  ideal  of  science   is   to  be  found   only  in  the 


30  CALIFORNIA   ANTHOLOGY.  / 

''  / 

j 

eternal  thoughts  of  God  the  Father — the  ideal  of  ;art 
only  in  the  person  of  God  the  Son.  Religion,  more 
perfect,  and  far  more  practical  than  either,  strives, 
through  the  influence  of  the  third  person,  the  Holy 
Spirit,  to  embody  the  same  ideal,  not  in  human  thought 
nor  in  human  works  of  art,  but  in  human  life  and 
human  character. — Prof.  Joseph  LcConte. 

23.  DRAWING. — Drawing,  or  the  art  of  design,  is 
often  pointed  at  as  a  superfluous  study.       It  is  only 
another  mode  of  writing ;   it  is  the  shorthand  of  idio- 
graphic  teaching;   while  the  hands  are  young  and  the 
fingers  pliant  they  are  the  most  easily  trained  to  pre 
cision;   the  picture  teaches  at  a  glance  that  which  it 
would  cost  pages  of  verbal  description  to  explain.     The 
books  of  science  of  the  present  day  teem  with  illustra- 
trations,  and  therein  it  is  that  the  youth  of  this  age  far 
outstrip  those  of  former  years  in  the  rapidity  of  their 
education.     He  who  learns  to-day  will  teach  to-morrow, 
and  to  him  should  be  given  every  facility  with  which  to 
stamp  his  thought  on  paper.      Let  the  machinist,  the 
engineer,  the  shipbuilder,  the  architect,   the  mechanic, 
the  engraver,  all  answer  what  can  they  do  without  their 
drawings  and  their  plans  ? — Dr.  A.  B.  Stout. 

24.  THE   HOME   OF   ART. — The  home  of  art    is 
where    Nature    stimulates    the    sensual   and  spiritual- 
intellectual.     Art  flourished  under  Grecian  skies.      In 
spired  by   the  spirit  of  beauty  that  dwelt  where  the 
chiefest  joys  of  earth,  sea,  and  sky  were  blended,  the 
Parthenon  arose  upon  the  brow  of  the  Acropolis  in  the 
transparent  air  of  Attica,  classic  groves  were   adorned 


SCIENCE    AND    ART.  37 

with  marble  men,  and  chastest  temples  solemnized  with 
statues  of  gods.  As  art  has  flourished  in  a  zone  where 
the  charms  of  Nature  invite  man  to  their  enjoyment, 
and  away  from  anxious  cares  for  self-preservation,  so  to 
the  simulation  of  a  generous  climate  and  its  attendant 
advantages  for  aesthetic  culture,  we  are  to  look  for  the 
founding  of  the  great  schools  of  art  upon  our  continent. 
Where  else  are  they  to  appear  but  on  the  Pacific  shores 
of  the  Great  Republic  ? — E.  G.  Waite. 

26.  ART  IN  CALIFORNIA. — The  little  that  has  been 
done  in  California  in  Art  is  rather  a  sign  of  better 
things  to  come.  Art  must  not  only  have  inspiration, 
but  it  needs  wealth  and  the  society  of  a  ripe  commu 
nity  for  its  best  estate.  It  is  possible  to  paint  for 
immortality  in  a  garret;  but  a  great  deal  of  work  done 
there  has  gone  to  the  lumber-room.  Not  only  must 
there  be  the  fostering  spirit  of  wealth  and  letters,  but 
Art  also  needs  a  picturesque  world  without — the  grand 
estate  of  mountains  and  valleys,  atmospheres,  tones> 
lights,  shadows ;  and  if  there  be  a  picturesque  people, 
we  might  look  for  a  new  school  of  Art,  and  even 
famous  painters.  Where  a  poet  can  be  inspired,  there 
look  also  for  the  poetry,  which  is  put  on  canvas. 

In  spite  of  our  civilization  there  is  a  great  deal  that 
is  picturesque  among  the  people — the  Parsee,  Moham 
medan,  Malay  and  Mongol,  whom  one  may  sometimes 
meet  on  the  same  street — the  red  shirt  of  the  Italian 
fisherman,  and  tl\e  lateen  sail  which  sends  his  boat 
flying  over  the  water.  The  very  distresses  and  dis 
trusts  of  men  here  have  made  them  picturesque. 


,354962 


38  CALIFORNIA  ANTHOLOGY. 

Moreover  the  whole  physical  aspect  of  the  country  \s 
wonderfully  picturesque.     The  palm  tree,  lifting  up  its 
fronded  head  in  the  desert,  the  great  fir  tree,  set  against 
the  ineffable  azure  of  the  heavens,  the  vine-clad  hills, 
th  serrated  mountains,  which  the  frosts  have  canonized 
with  their  sealed  and  unsealed  fountains,  and   ill  the 
gold  and  purple  which  touch  the  hills  at  eventide — these 
are   the  full  rich  ministries  of  Nature.      It  may  take 
Art  a  thousand  years  to  ripen  even  here.     For  how 
many  ages  had  the  long  procession  of  painters  come  and 
gone  before  Raphael  and  Michael  Angelo  appeared  ? 
Our  young  Art  school  will  some  day  have  its  treas 
ures;  and  there  will  be  hung  on  our  walls  the  portraits 
of  other  men,  whose  culture  and  influence  will  be  worth 
more  than   all  the  gold  of  our  mountains.     Let  the 
artist  set  up  his  easel  and  write  his  silent  poem  upon 
the  canvas.     Welcome  all  influences  which  soften  this 
hard  and  barren  materialism.      Before  the  mountains 
were  unvexed  by  the  miner's  drill,  the  land  itself  was 
a  poem  and  a  picture.     One  day  the  turbid  streams 
will  turn  to    crystal    again,  and  the  only  miner  will 
be  the   living   glacier    sitting  on  its  white  throne  of 
judgment,  and  grinding  the  very  mountains  to  pow 
der.      Fortunate  they  who  can  catch  this  wealth  of  in 
spiration.    These  are  the  ministers  and  prophets  whose 
larger  and  finer    interpretation  of  Nature  is   part    of 
the    treasures    of    the    new     commonwealth. — W.   C. 
Bartlett. 

26.  SCULPTURE. — It  is  said  that  the  ancients  have 
exhausted  the  domain  of  sculpture,  because  they  have 
delineated  the  human  form  in  its  greatest  perfection. 


SCIENCE    AND   ART.  39 

They  have  done  this  and  we  concede  it.  But  form 
is  not  all.  There  are  also  action,  passion  and  senti 
ment.  We  claim  that  we  have  advanced  somewhat 
in  two  thousand  years,  and  during  that  period  have 
attained  to  a  higher  and  more  sentimental  civilization. 
If  this  claim  be  true,  then  we  have  higher  ideas  and 
sentiments  to  express  in  painting  and  sculpture  than 
had  our  predecessors  in  art,  Zeuxis  and  Apelles,  Phidias 
and  Praxiteles.  We  may  hope  to  equal  them  in  the 
expression  of  physical  beauty,  and  to  excel  them  in 
moral  and  sentimental  beauty. 

Let  us,  meanwile,  be  just  to  the  ancients.  They 
have  left  us  so  many  impure  and  obscene  remains,  that 
many  critics  have  considered  them  as  characteristic 
specimens  of  th~ir  art.  But  a  careful  observation 
demonstrates  that  these  impure  remains  are  almost 
always  in  a  style  of  art  imperfect,  both  in  design  and 
execution,  and  that  able  artists  would  not  degrade 
themselves  to  such  subjects.  Even  at  the  Renaissance 
it  is  remarkable  how  the  greatest  modern  artists  often 
gave  the  grossest  material  interpretations  to  those 
mythological  fables  out  of  which  the  ancient  Pagan 
artists  constructed  the  most  poetical  conceptions. 
Titian  represents  Danae  as  purchased  for  the  embraces 
of  Jupiter  by  a  shower  of  golden  ducats  poured  into 
her  lap.  The  Pagan  artist,  whose  work  is  preserved 
at  Pompeii,  pictures  her  as  an  innocent  maiden  seated 
upon  a  green  bank  in  the  recesses  of  a  garden,  who 
unveils  her  bosom  to  a  warm,  moist  mist,  golden  with 
the  evening  of  sunshine,  which  gently  wafts  itself  over 
her,  and  in  this  form  the  treacherous  and  seductive  god 


40  ^CALIFORNIA   ANTHOLOGY. 

insinuates  himself  beneath  the  -folds  of  her  drapery. 
The  modern  artist  portrays  Leda  submitting  herself  to 
Jove,  approaching  her  under  the  form  of  a  swan  in  the 
grossest  and  most  material  modes.  The  ancient  painter 
depicts  a  swan  fleeing  from  a  vulture,  and  received  by 
a  compassionate  virgin  into  her  bosom,  and  shielded 
there  by  her  arms  and  beneath  her  garments.  And  we 
are  constantly  called  upon  to  wonder  how  the  great 
artists  of  the  fourteenth  century  could  lend  themselves 
to  the  most  material  conceptions. 

To  say  that  modern  art  may  not  excel  ancient  art,  is 
to  say  that  we  are  to  make  no  progress  in  sentiment 
and  idea.  The  ancients  expressed  perfectly  all  they 
had  to  express.  The  Greek  ideal  and  Roman  ideal 
have  survived  to  us.  The  Hebrew  ideal  has  not  come 
down  to  us,  for  the  Jews  did  not  cultivate  sculpture  or 
painting;  nor  the  Egyptians,  because  among  them  it 
was  reduced  to  merely  conventional  and  sacerdotal 
forms.  But  there  is  nothing  Christian  nor  spiritual 
in  Grecian  or  Roman  art.  Could  a  Greek  or  Roman 
artist  even  conceive  such  a  picture  as  the  Beatrice  and 
Dante  of  Ary  Scheffer  ?  a  love  so  intense,  so  unsen- 
sual,  so  perfect,  so  pure  ?  And  the  Nydia,  whom  our 
own  Randolph  Rogers  has  consigned  to  immortality, 
is  not  a  heathen  but  Christian  conception.  "  Greater 
love  hath  no  man  than  this,  that  he  give  his  life  for 
his  friend."  In  this  marble  there  is  the  very  highest 
expression  of  this  sentiment ;  a  prophecy  not  merely 
of  self-sacrifice  to  the  Glaucus,  whom  Nydia  loves  with 
all  the  love  of  woman,  but  also  of  sacrifice  to  lone, 
whom  he  loves,  the  very  rival  of  the  devoted  victim. 


SCIENCE    AND    ART.  41 

Does  all  the  poetry  of  antiquity  mount  to  the  con 
ception  of  such  a  devotion  as  this  ?  Does  all  the  art 
of  antiquity  excel  its  realization  in  the  living  marble  ? 
In  his  beautiful  romance  of  Zanoni,  Bulwer  repre 
sents  a  sage  who  had  won  from  nature  the  secret  of 
immortal  life  upon  earth,  as  apostrophizing  the  simple 
herbs  which  men  unconsciously  crushed  beneath  the 
tread  of  their  feet,  but  in  whose  juices  were  concealed 
potential  agencies  which  contain  life  and  death,, 
strength  and  paralysis,  vigor  and  disease,  wakefulness 
and  sleep,  hope  and  despair,  madness  and  reason,  tears 
and  laughter.  But  it  seems  to  me  that  the  great  magi 
cian,  the  sculptor,  has  a  vastly  larger  power  than  this. 
He  breathes  the  breath  of  genius  upon  the  dead  marble, 
and  it  instinctively  starts  into  perpetual  life,  in  eyery 
possible  form  of  action  or  repose,  and  beaming  with 
every  conceivable  expression  of  passion  or  sentiment. 
And  so  with  prophetic  vision  we  can  see  the  highest 
expression  of  the  highest  sentiment  of  the  future 
perfected  civilization  going  down  to  immortality 
with  our  own  Nydia;  with  the  gladiator  forever  dy 
ing,  yet  never  dead;  with  the  perpetual  agony  of  the 
Laocoon;  with  Niobe  lamenting  to  all  future  genera 
tions  the  slaughter  of  her  children;  and  with  Apollo, 
eternally  triumphing  with  the 'majesty  and  beauty  of  a 
youthful  god. — John  W.  Dwinelle. 

27.  ANCIENT  ARCHITECTURE. — In  the  morning  of 
time,  and  long  before  civilization  had  visited  the  world, 
before  the  races  of  men  had  emerged  from  their  tribal 
relations,  the  sounds  of  the  Masons'  labor  were  heard. 


1 
42  CALIFORNIA   ANTHOLOGY. 

With  such  implements  as  the  forest,  the  spoils  of  the 
chase  and  the  quarry  afforded,  they  performed  their 
allotted  tasks.  Then  began  the  earliest  attempts  at 
monumental  architecture.  They  consisted  of  mounds 
of  earth,  solitary  upright  stones,  tables  of  rock,  and 
circles  of  the  same  material,  often  enclosing  vast  areas 
dotted  with  similar  objects.  These  rude  monuments, 
erected  at  a  time  and  by  peoples  over  whose  history 
rests  the  pall  of  everlasting  silence,  are  found  in  every 
land.  They  stand  on  the  plains  and  mountains  of 
Europe,  amid  the  deserts  of  the  Orient,  and  in  the 
shade  of  the  primeval  forests  of  America.  They  bear 
no  design,  and  have  no  device  or  inscription  to  explain 
their  origin  or  purpose.  They  are  the  weird  and  voice 
less  relics  of  a  remote  and  unremembered  past.  We 
can  only  conjecture  that  they  were  intended  to  com 
memorate  some  important  event,  and  aid  in  transmit 
ting  the  tradition  of  it  to  future  generations.  Long 
after  the  commencement  of  historic  time  such  a  custom 
prevailed,  for  we  read  in  the  holy  writings  that  a  leader 
of  Israel  placed  a  stone  near  the  sanctuary  where  the 
Most  High  had  spoken  to  his  people,  and  said:  "  Be 
hold  this  stone  shall  be  a  witness  unto  us,  for  it  hath 
heard  all  the  words  of  the  Lord."  At  last  the  creative 
genius  of  a  mortal,  whose  name  or  birth-place  is  un 
known,  conferred  on  his  race  a  blessing  like  to  that  of 
the  fabled  Prometheus  when  he  brought  to  earth  a 
spark  from  the  celestial  fires.  With  an  inspiration 
almost  divine  he  discovered  a  mode  of  transmuting  the 
dull  ores  of  earth  into  lustrous  metals,  and  fashioned 
them  into  the  manifold  tools  and  implements  of  labor. 


SCIENCE    AND    ART.  43 

The  light  that  shone  from  the  first  forge  of  the  pre 
historic  age  was  the  grandest  illumination  this  world 
has  ever  witnessed.  We  can  imagine  that  the  bright- 
eyed  spirits  of  art,  science,  and  of  myriad  industries 
beheld  its  rays  from  their  starry  home,  and  amid  the 
heavenly  symphonies  of  shining  orbs  winged  their 
flight  to  a  planet  which  now  wooed  their  embraces. 
With  the  iron-age  architecture  assumed  the  exactness 
of  a  science  while  it  retained  all  the  graces  of  art.  In 
the  Valley  of  the  Nile  we  find  the  earliest  achieve 
ments  of  architectural  genius ;  efforts  which  in  grandeur 
and  massiveness  are  unrivaled,  and  which  may  endure 
till  Time  shall  be  no  more.  In  a  narrow  strip  of  inhabit 
able  land  extending  from  the  river  to  the  rocks  and 
deserts,  Temples,  Tombs,  Pyramids  and  Obelisks  rise 
in  sublime  vastness,  the  wonder  and  glory  of  the  world, 
and  the  admiration  of  the  ages.  What  mechanical 
agencies  were  employed  in  their  construction,  or  what 
tools  were  used  in  tracing  the  inscriptions  which  are 
carved  on  their  walls,  are  mysteries  which  the  researches 
of  science  have  failed  to  solve.  The  great  pyramid  of 
Ghizeh,  far  higher  than  any  edifice  which  modern  art 
has  builded  and  dwarfing  by  comparison  the  most  spa 
cious  cathedral  of  Europe,  carries  the  imagination  be 
yond  the  period  of  authentic  history  into  the  twilight 
of  tradition.  When  our  continent  was  peopled  by 
nations  that  have  vanished  like  shadows  from  the  earth; 
before  the  Israelites  had  escaped  from  thraldom  and 
placed  the  oracles  of  God  near  the  waters  of  Siloa; 
ages  before  civilization  had  dawned  on  the  banks  of 
the  Tiber  or  the  shores  of  Greece,  this  pyramid  and 


44  CALIFORNIA    ANTHOLOGY. 

other  tombs  and  temples  of  the  Nile  had  witnessed  the 
silent  march  of  the  centuries  as  they  sped  onward  to 
the  eternity  of  the  past.  Hundreds  of  generations  of 
men  have  toiled  and  passed  away — empires  have  arisen, 
flourished  and  died — creeds,  systems,  and  dynasties 
have  disappeared,  leaving  no  trace  on  the  sands  of 
time;  mountains  have  been  upheaved  by  volcanic  fires 
of  the  globe,  islands  have  emerged  from  the  depths  of 
ocean  and  sunk  beneath  its  waves,  flaming  worlds  have 
shone  in  the  firmament  and  wandered  from  their  orbits 
into  night  and  chaos;  and  yet,  amid  all  changes  and 
revolutions,  these  monuments  have  stood  in  their 
imperishable  and  unchangeable  majesty  on  the  confines 
of  the  mighty  desert. 

On  reflection  we  can  readily  trace  to  their  proper 
cause  the  peculiar  characteristics  of  the  works  of  Egyp 
tian  masonry.  The  vast  and  shadeless  deserts,  the 
Nile  with  its  turbid  waters  flowing  from  mysterious  and 
unexplored  sources  to  the  sea,  the  sea  itself — all  sur 
rounding,  unfathomable  and  unknown — were  types  of 
the  illimitable  and  eternal  Egyptian  architecture  that 
received  from  the  influence  of  such  scenes,  form  and 
expression.  It  was  an  inevitable  result.  Hence  arose 
the  structures  whose  massive  strength  and  gloomy  vast- 
ness  have  defied  the  power  of  man  and  the  elements 
to  mar  or  destroy. 

At  a  much  later  period,  and  in  the  Isles  of  Greece 
we  behold  architectural  efforts,  in  style  and  design  as 
divergent  from  the  sombre  monuments  in  the  Valley  of 
the  Nile  as  the  versatile  genius  of  the  Greek  differed 
from  the  gloomy  mind  of  the  oriental  builder.  The 


SCIENCE    AND    ART.  45- 

happy  temperament  and  brilliant  fancy  of  the  former 
revelled  in  the  adoration  of  the  beautiful.  He  delighted 
in  every  form  of  art  and  every  manifestation  of  nature 
that  pleased  the  senses  or  charmed  the  imagination.  He 
peopled  the  rivers',  groves,  and  mountains  of  his  native 
land  with  beings  of  more  than  mortal  loveliness.  He 
heard  the  glad  voices  of  his  joyous  deities  in  the  rush 
of  the  waves,  the  rustle  of  the  leaves,  the  murmur  of 
the  winds,  the  music  of  the  waterfall,  and  embodied  his, 
poetic  conceptions  in  sculpture,  architecture,  and  verse 
that  lives  when  the  works  of  his  plastic  hand  are  in 
mouldering  ruin.  The  Grecian  temples  in  their  free-- 
dom,  lightness,  grace  and  variety,  reflected  alike  the 
ideal  character  of  the  religion  of  the  time,  and  the 
intellect  of  the  people.  The  glory  of  Greece  has 
departed.  The  same  sun  that  gilded  the  gardens  of 
Attica,  and  the  plains  of  Marathon,  shines  now  on  the 
ruined  walls  and  desecrated  shrines  of  her  temples. 
Land  of  philosophy,  song,  poesy  and  eloquence,  whose 
immortal  spirit  illumes  and  instructs  a  world,  how  art 
thou  fallen,  and  yet  how  lovely  in  thy  desolation ! 
Roman,  Goth,  Moslem  and  Frank  have  ravaged  thy 
fields  and  robbed  thee  of  thy  treasures  of  art,  but 
happily  none  can  tear  from  thy  brow  the  amaranthine- 
wreath  of  fame,  or  pale  the  glorious  memories  of  the 
past. 

"  No  earth  of  thine  is  lost  in  common  mould, 
But  one  vast  realm  of  wonder  spreads  around, 
And  all  the  muses'  tales  seem  truly  told." 

Rome,  in  the  style  of  her  temples,  imitated,  with  very 
slight  differences,  Grecian  architecture.     Her  architects. 


46  CALIFORNIA    ANTHOLOGY. 

essayed  at  one  time  to  improve  on  the  beautiful  origi 
nal,  and  gave  to  the  world  the  Tuscan  and  Composite 
orders.  Vain  attempt  to  rival  in  marble  the  magnifi 
cent  conceptions  of  Greece!  The  Doric,  Ionic  and 
Corinthian  pillars,  with  their  graceful  shafts,  capitals 
and  exquisite  mouldings,  upheld  and  adorned  the  tem 
ples  of  gods  throughout  the  empire.  To  Rome,  how 
ever,  the  civilized  world  is  indebted  for  the  introduction 
of  the  Arch.  The  Greeks  and  the  Egyptians  were 
either  neglectful  or  ignorant  of  its  uses  and  principle. 
The  Romans  employed  it  not  only  to  embellish  and 
improve  their  cities,  but  carried  it  into  distant  provinces, 
and  by  its  aid  constructed  bridges  across  wide  and 
rapid  streams  for  the  passage  of  their  victorious  legions. 
In  their  forums  with  splendid  architectural  porticos,  in 
their  theatres  and  amphitheatres  which  could  seat 
armies,  in  their  mighty  aqueducts  through  which  the 
waters  of  rivers  were  conducted  to  their  cities,  the 
genius  of  the  Roman  people  asserted  its  superiority, 
and  left  models  for  the  nations  of  the  present  day  to 
admire  and  imitate. 

With  the  fall  of  the  Roman  Empire  in  the  west  there 
arose  another  order  of  architecture.  It  indicated  a 
new  era  in  the  world's  history.  In  the  fourth  and  fifth 
centuries  the  Goths  and  other  races  poured  from  their 
northern  homes  upon  the  doomed  provinces  of  Rome. 
No  human  power  availed  against  their  resistless  march. 
From  the  shores  of  the  German  ocean  their  camp-fires 
extended  to  the  walls  of  the  Imperial  City.  Among 
these  warlike  nations  what  is  known  as  the  Order  of 
Gothic  Architecture1  had  its  origin.  It  was  introduced 


SCIENCE    AND    ART.  47 

t    5 

by  them  into  the  north  of  Italy  in  the  fourth  century, 
and  remained  unchanged  until  the  Crusaders  at  a  later 
period  engrafted  upon  it  the  designs  of  buildings  which 
they  had  viewed  with  delight  in  the  Mohammedan  and 
Saracenic  lands  of  the  East.  In  the  tall  spires,  pointed 
arches  and  delicate  traceries  of  the  Gothic  architecture, 
we  see  the  influence  of  fancies  that  had  been  moulded 
by  the  lights  and  shadows  of  the  forest — by  the  over 
arching  branches  of  the  grand  old  trees,  the  caves  with 
their  sparry  columns,  and  by  the  mountains  with  their 
dark  gorges  and  beetling  crags. 

The  Greeks  dedicated  their  temples  to  the  protect 
ing  deities  of  a  city  or  state  and  displayed  in  their 
adornment  a  poetic  character  and  speculative  tendency. 
The  Gothic  races  on  the  contrary  designed  their  reli 
gious  edifices  for  the  worship  of  a  personal,  ever-present 
God  by  the  individual  man.  This  idea  predominates 
in  the  plan  of  every  cathedral  of  the  medieval  ages, 
and  is  perhaps  to-day  the  distinguishing  trait  which 
renders  the  Gothic  architecture  for  devotional  purposes 
more  suitable  than  any  model  from  antiquity. — Frank 
Tilford. 


II. 

LITERATURE  AND  EDUCATION. 


PART    II. 


LITERATURE  AND  EDUCATION. 


28.  EDUCATION    AIMS   TO    PERFECT    MAN'S    NA 
TURE. — Education  includes  all  the  influences  that  are, 
or  can  be,  brought  to  bear  upon  the  individual,  to  form 
his  constitution,  actions,  thoughts,  and  feelings  ;   soil, 
climate,  parentage,  laws,  manners,  customs,  home,  so 
ciety,  literature,  and  whatever  else  helps  to  build  up  the 
man  into  the  perfection  of  his  nature,  or  hinders  the 
attainment  of  that  perfection. — Rev.  Horatio  Stcbbins. 

29.  A  RIDDLE. — A  science  in  itself,  it  is  the  parent 
of  all    sciences,   and   though    most  studied,    yet  least 
understood.      In  what  form,  and  by  what  agencies,  and 
under  what  control,  it  ought  to  be  administered,  is  a 
still  unsettled  problem.     Constituting  a  state  question 
of  vital  interest  to  all  the  foremost  nations,  it  has  only 
led  into  conflicting  and  distractive  theories,   while  the 
enigma  it  presents  still  waits  solution.     No  CEdipus  can 
read  the  riddle  of  this   modern  sphinx. — Joseph    W. 
Winans. 

30.  BUT  ONE  OF  SEVERAL  ELEMENTS. — The  neces 
sity  for  the  education  of  all  the  people  must  be  con- 

4 


50  CALIFORNIA  ANTHOLOGY. 

ceded,  but  the  power  of  education  is  often  overesti 
mated  by  our  writers.  It  is  but  one  of  several  patent 
elements,  all  of  which  are  necessary  to  liberty  and 
security.  The  capacity  to  know,  and  the  will  to  per 
form,  are  two  very  different  things.  Education  will 
create  the  first,  but  cannot  always  confer  the  second. 
The  history  of  mankind  would  seem  to  sustain  this 
statement. — Peter  H.  Burnett. 


31.  THE  PROFESSIONAL  TEACHER. — I  have  the 
highest  respect  for  a  teacher  who  devotes  his  life  to  teach 
ing  as  a  profession.  Educated  at  great  expense,  always 
studying  to  keep  up  with  all  discoveries  in  science  and 
advances  in  literature,  he  debars  himself  from  all  oppor 
tunities  for  fortune  that  may  disclose  themselves  in  the 
avenues  for  wealth  in  the  profitable  world,  that  he  may 
be  poorly  paid  and  have  the  consolation  of  knowing 
that  some  portion  of  mankind  has  made  progress,  and 
that  the  world  will  be  the  better  because  he  has  lived 
in  it.  Without  men  and  women  who  will  make  this 
sacrifice,  society  would  soon  revert  to  its  original  bar 
barous  condition.  Civilization  is  a  perpetual  struggle. 
After  two  thousand  years  of  Christian  teaching  we  can 
see  daily  that  the  cloak  of  civilization  is  but  a  thin 
garment,  easily  discarded  and  scantily  covering  the 
original  savage.  The  teacher,  clergyman,  and  the 
Christian  missionary  should  be  the  most  honored  by 
society.  They  accept  small  pay  and  make  lifelong 
sacrifices  that  the  race  may  advance  in  knowledge  and 
virtue. — B.  B.  Redding. 


LITERATURE  AND  EDUCATION.  51 

32.  THE  NECESSITY  FOR  COMPETENT  TEACHERS. — 
To  bring  a  school  of  one  or  two  hundred  boys  and  girls, 
quick  living  minds,  bright  possibilities,  into  contact,  day 
after  day,  with  a  sluggish,    stupid,   empty    mind,    the 
refuse  of  some  college  class,  rejected  with  disdain  by 
one  of  the  other  professions,  is  something  worse  than 
absurd  and  ridiculous  ;   it  is  no  less  an  atrocity   than 
that  Mezentian  punishment  committed  by  the  terrible 
ingenuity  of   Heathenism,  when    "it  tied   the  healthy 
man   to   the  loathsome  corpse,  and  left  the   living  and 
the  dead  to  corrupt  together."     No,  my  friends,  if  there 
be  any  place  under  the  sun  from  which  stupid  men  and 
women  should  be  inexorably  banished,  more  than  from 
any  other,  it  is  the  teacher's  desk.      Better,  by  far,  that 
they  be  set  to  work  to  make  clumsy  chairs  and   leaky 
boots  and  shoes,  than  to  mar  and  ruin  God's  marvellous 
handiwork  in  a  boy  or  girl.     For  the  sake  of  the  rising 
generation,    for   the    sake  of   future    developments    in 
science  and    art,   for  the    honor  of  the   country,  for  a 
credit  to  ourselves,  for  the  sake  of  the  world,  give  to 
your  schools  nothing  but  a  high  and  suitable  order  of 
mind. — Rev.  F.  C.  Ewer. 

33.  EDUCATION  AS  A  MORAL  FORCE. — Education 
is   not   exclusively  a  literary,    scientific,   and  aesthetic 
power,  but  it  is  besides,  a  potent  moral  force.      It  ren 
ders  him  who,  by  his  birth,  was  but  an  agency  of  evil, 
by  his  intelligence  an  instrument  of  good.     Although 
there  may  be   instances  where  the  vices  of  humanity 
have  been  expanded  into  greater  vigor,  and.  rendered 
more  destructive  by  the  aid  of  knowledge,  yet  these 


52  CALIFORNIA   ANTHOLOGY. 

are  but  exceptional.  It  is  a  sarcasm,  rather  than  an 
argument,  which  urges  that  the  innate  evil  is  only 
intensified  by  education  into  educated  evil,  and  thus 
rendered  more  capable  of  mischief;  for  the  very  dis 
cipline  of  mental  culture,  the  habitudes  it  forms,  the 
ideas  it  creates,  the  lessons  it  imparts,  whether,  from 
nature,  by  scientific  exploration,  or  from  literature  by 
the  lofty  sentiments  of  the  poets,  philosophers,  his 
torians  and  moralists  of  every  age — all  tend  to  stimu 
late  the  moral  sense.  Thus  grappling  with  man's 
mental,  intellectual,  and  moral  nature,  education  brings 
them  from  their  lethargy  into  complete  development. 
It  is  the  fulcrum  Archimedes  needed  to  accomplish  the 
Kosmon  Kincso.  It  is  the  philosopher's  stone  which 
transmutes  man's  baser  metal  into  gold.  It  is  the 
chisel  of  Thorwalsden  which  forces  out  from  the  rough 
marble  block  a  sculptured  form  of  symmetry  and 
beauty.  The  ugly  duck,  in  the  pathetic  Apologue  of 
Andersen,  though  persecuted  by  the  flock,  was  a  true 
swan  from  the  beginning,  and  only  grew  from  its 
original  deformity  into  the  natural  comeliness  of  all  its 
tribe.  In  seeming,  merely,  did  it  constitute  the  meaner 
bird.  But  education  is  not  limited  unto  development. 
It  recreates  that  which  it  beautifies.  It  turns  the  ugly 
duck  into  a  swan,  by  an  absolute  reversal  of  its  nature. 
— Joseph  W.  Winans. 

34.  INTELLECTUAL  HONESTY. — What  do  we  mean 
by  intellectual  development  and  the  emancipation,  or 
freedom  of  thought?  There  is  reason  to  believe  that 
there  is  a  good  deal  of  vague  idea  and  loose  talk,  and 


LITERATURE    AND    EDUCATION.  53 

perhaps  some  cant  about  these  things.  It  is  quite 
natural  that  there  should  be.  New  ideas  are,  to  some 
minds,  a  little  too  bracing  at  first,  and  bring  on  the  ex 
hilaration  of  surprise,  and  a  man  is  excited  at  finding 
the  lost  key  of  the  universe.  I  met  such  an  one  the 
other  day.  He  had  got  everything,  but  a  nutshell  to 
put  it  in.  But  let  us  forgive  something  to  that  pleas 
ant  confidence  that  in  a  moment  of  undue  familiarity 
would  lift  the  veil  from  the  face  of  nature.  The  cant 
that  is  sometimes  heard  is  not  altogether  discreditable, 
for  cant  is  almost  always  about  that  which  is  good,  and 
only  indicates  a  lack  of  intellectual  and  moral  fibre. 

By  intellectual  development,  we  do  not  surely  mean 
that  any  new  faculty  has  been  added  to  the  mind ; 
neither  do  we  mean  that  any  accession  has  been  made 
to  the  fundamental  and  essential  principles  ot  human 
nature.  By  intellectual  development,  I  understand 
the  gradual  growth  of  improved  methods  of  the  mind  in 
its  inquiries  after  the  trutJi  of  things  and  events  in  the 
material  and  in  the  human  world.  It  is  a  better  logic, 
it  is  a  better  observation  of  facts,  a  finer  perception  of 
analogies,  a  more  subtle  detection  of  difference,  a  long- 
minded  staying  power  of  generalization,  and  a  firmer 
grasp  of  the  law  of  cause  and  effect.  The  illustration 
of  this  is  found  in  the  fact  that  the  reasons  that  satisfied 
the  mind  of  an  early  age  do  not  satisfy  the  mind  of  a 
later  age,  even  when  those  reasons  come  to  the  same 
result.  Socrates,  in  the  Phsedo,  draws  persuasions  for 
a  belief  in  immortality,  from  the  succession  of  day  and 
night.  That  would  hardly  satisfy  the  mind  of  to-day ; 
the  truth  requires  a  better  method  in  the  mind.  Intel- 


54  CALIFORNIA  ANTHOLOGY. 

lectual  development  has  been  attended  by  a  recon 
struction  of  the  methods  on  which  science  depends,  and 
Bacon,  on  the  empirical  side,  and  Descartes,  on  the  in 
tellectual  side,  are  its  great  historic  exponents.  It  is 
no  spread-eagle  glory,  but  a  patient,  subtle  process  of 
intellectual  power.  There  are  laws  of  thought:  and 
reasoned  truth,  that  knows  no  fortuitous  luck,  and  no 
blind  gropings  of  chance  or  passion,  is  the  only  worthy 
achievement  of  the  mind.  Intellectual  development 
is  not  merely  an  individual  endowment,  but  a  common- 
sense  of  truth  and  right  reason  in  the  common  mind. 
It  is  the  increase  of  the  idea  of  order,  law,  cause,  and 
consequence  in  the  mind  of  an  age. 

Freedom  of  thought  has  no  existence,  except  when 
based  on  intellectual  development,  such  as  this1.  On  any 
other  grounds,  free  thought  is  in  the  intellectual  world 
what  free  love  is  in  the  sensual  world.  Without  this 
recitude  of  the  intellect,  thinking  itself  is  a  vagary,  and 
truth  is  a  caprice  of  self-will.  To  be  intellectually 
.honest,  is  the  last  accomplishment  of  a  mind  that  moves 
without  passion  or  prejudice  in  the  happy  rhythm  of 
truth,  simply  seeking  to  know  what  is.  Intellectual 
honesty  is  much  more  rare  than  moral  honesty. — Rev. 
Horatio  Stebbins. 

35.  THE  PURSUIT  OF  KNOWLEDGE. — The  pursuit 
of  knowledge  may  be  likened  to  the  ascent  of  a  moun 
tain.  With  slow  and  painful  steps  we  climb  its  rugged 
side.  Thorns  and  brambles  block  the  way  and  lacerate 
the  flesh.  Through  the  rank  undergrowth  no  vista  is 
disclosed,  no  prospect  opens.  Dense  thickets  close 


LITERATURE   AND    EDUCATION.  55 

each  avenue  of  sight.  From  the  thick  atmosphere 
there  comes  a  sense  of  stifling  to  the  panting  breast. 
Repeated  pauses  are  enforced,  to  obviate  exhaustion. 
As  we  mount  higher,  casual  gleams  appear  of  the 
expanding  landscape  far  below,  then  flit  away.  New 
difficulties  thwart  our  progress  while  we  rise,  until  the 
jaded  spirit  seems  about  to  faint.  But  when  the  sum 
mit  is  attained,  how  utterly  all  consciousness  of  past 
endurance  sinks  beneath  the  gorgeous  vision  which 
there  bursts  upon  our  gaze :  "All  is  forgot  in  that 
blithe  jubilee."  So  it  is  with  the  course  of  learning. 
Constrained  into  a  hateful  discipline,  the  mind  shrinks 
from  that  dry  detail  of  rules  and  problems,  lines  and 
angles,  rudiments  and  grammars,  which,  from  the  out 
set,  guides  the  student  on  his  upward  path.  They  seem 
to  him  a  miscellaneous  array  of  things  incongruous, 
without  vitality  or  application,  to  be  forced  into  memory 
by  long  and  painful  effort,  for  no  seeming  good.  To 
them  there  is  no  landscape,  no  vistaed  revelation  of 
utility  or  beauty, — nothing  but  a  close,  stifling  mental 
atmosphere  that  chokes  the  spirit.  Yet  when  the  stu 
dent's  life  mounts  higher  up ;  when  these  abstractions 
merge  in  bright  and  living  truths ;  when  physics  ulti 
mate  in  those  experimental  facts  which  throw  new  light 
on  science;  when  grammar  opens  up  the  rich  resources 
of  the  Greek  and  Latin  tongues,  with  all  the  modern 
classics — throwing  open  to  the  scholar's  reach  the  grand 
ideas  born  in  every  age,  the  burning  thoughts  and 
glowing  words  of  sophists,  statesmen,  orators  and  poets ; 
when  mathematics  guide  him  to  an  undiscovered  star; 
then  is  the  mountain  summit  scaled,  and  knowledge 


56  CALIFORNIA  ANTHOLOGY. 

vindicates   its   power  in  the  insufferable   glory  there 
revealed. — Joseph   W.    Winans. 

36.  THE  EVOLUTION  OF  MIND.; — Genius  alone, 
unaided  by  education,  can  have  but  a  feeble  flight. 
Innate  intellect  may  exalt  a  self-taught  poet;  but  can 
not  alone  constitute  an  astronomer.  The  diamond  in 
the  rough  may  pass  forever  unheeded,  but  not  until  the 
friction  of  the  wheel  of  labor  and  study  shall  have  eli 
cited  its  latent  fire,  will  its  polish  reflect  its  merit. 

The  development  of  education  should  follow  the 
evolution  of  mind.  The  course  of  educaiion  is  the 
mirror  of  nature,  and  should  be  achromatic  in  its  re 
flections  of  light.  The  direction  of  its  instruction 
should  be  predicated  upon  the  growth  of  the  organic 
intellect. 

The  first  feeble  glimmerings  of  brain-work  in  the 
infant,  in  its  instincts  to  get  nutrition,  are  progressively 
fostered  by  the  mother  until  it  learns  to  feed  alone;  the 
first  rays  of  mind  which  kindle  curiosity  in  the  child 
are  brightened  by  showing  it  noisy  and  glittering  ob 
jects ;  the  parent-puzzling  boy,  with  his  "whys"  and 
"wherefores,"  is  satisfied  with  lettered  blocks,  pictures 
and  puzzles,  until,  with  growing  brain  and  expanding 
intelligence,  he  explores  with  his  eyes  the  natural  world 
around  him,  and  finally,  in  manhood,  seeks  in  books 
aid  from  his  predecessors,  aspiring  to  grasp  in  his  com 
prehension  all  the  forces  in  illimitable  space.  These, 
then,  are  the  natural  epochs  in  life's  education,  and 
such  the  course  to  pursue  in  man's  tuition.  The  edu 
cation  of  the  past  has  shot  wide  of  this  mark.  How 


LITERATURE   AND    EDUCATION.  57 

vain  would  be  its  recapitulation.  Search  the  historic 
schools  of  philosophy.  Look  at  the  inflictions  of  re 
ligious  and  political  powers. 

But  "the  Now"  is  another  era.  The  Present,  in  be 
half  of  the  Future,  speaks  with  a  loftier  voice.  With 
''Truth"  inscribed  upon  her  banner,  and  "  Freedom"  em 
blazoned  on  her  escutcheon,  Science  calmly  but  surely 
advances,  without  arrogance,  yet,  with  a  step  in  her 
march,  accelerated  beyond  what  has  ever  heretofore 
been  known.  Doubtless  it  was  this  progress  in  learn 
ing,  this  aspiration  for  freedom  of  thought,  this  expan 
sive  spirit  of  Science,  which  gave  origin  and  impetus  to 
the  grand  fusion  of  the  divided  German  States  into  the 
great  unified  German  Empire ;  for  Germany,  however 
it  may  be  a  people's  Empire,  in  Science,  is  Learning's 
Republic.—  Dr.  A.  B.  Stout. 

37.  THE  PEN. — Ah,  thou  little  implement,  how 
much  of  undeserved  reputation  hast  thou  blazoned  ! 
How  many  noble  thoughts  depicted!  How  many  phi 
losophical  reflections  embodied!  The  tomes  of  history 
are  thy  biography !  Without  thee  tradition  perishes. 
The  troubadors  who  despised  thee  are  extinct,  and 
their  improvised  sonnets  forgotten.  With  thy  aid,  the 
epics  and  heroics  of  the  dead  poets  still  survive  to 
crown  their  names  with  immortality!  "The  pen,"  said 
the  dramatist,  "is  mightier  than  the  sword;"  and  the 
dramatist  has  said  truly.  It  is  the  architect  of  mind 
that  molds  its  language  into  form,  and  frescoes  it  with 
the  word-limning  of  the  scholar.  It  rescues,  preserves, 
transmits,  and  fixes  its  subject  like  the  granite  base,  for 


58  CALIFORNIA  ANTHOLOGY. 

the  building  of  a  structure  of  fame.  It  stimulates  the 
prosperity  of  states,  and  secures  the  triumph  of  diplo 
macy.  Heroes  depend  upon  it  for  their  ovations.  To 
literature  it  is  the  galleon,  with  flowing  sails — freighted 
with  intellectual  treasures.  The  down-hearted  take  cour 
age  from  the  fearlessness  of  its  strictures,  and  tyrants 
tremble  at  its  power.  This  is  thy  eulogy,  my  companion, 
and  my  friend.  Plucked  though  thou  be  from  an  igno 
ble  wing,  the  Damacus  steel  can  make  no  deeper  or 
surer  incision.  The  sword  has  no  such  panegyric.  The 
phrase,  "It  destroys,"  is  at.  once  its  history  and  its 
epitaph — and  for  the  record  of  even  this  brief  sentence, 
it  is  indebted  to  thee.  Yes,  thou  art  much  greater  than 
the  sword;  and  so  let  the  thesis  and  the  antithesis  of 
thy  measurement  go  together. —  William  Bailsman. 

38.  PHYSICAL  AND  MENTAL  PLEASURES.  -  -  The 
purely  animal  pleasures  are  adapted,  evidently,  by  their 
narrowness  of  range,  to  this  little  span  of  life — hardly 
is  there  variety  enough  in  them  tb  go  around  the  three- 
score-years-and-ten.  Who,  as  he  has  sat  down  to  his 
table,  has  not  felt  how  monotonous  and  drear  a  life  of 
a  thousand  years  would  be,  with  the  same  dull  round 
of  beef,  pork,  mutton  or  venison  ?  Who  has  not  sym 
pathized  with  me,  when,  long  suffering  man  that  I  am, 
my  temper  gave  way  at  the  seventh  reception  of  the 
saddle  of  lamb  in  the  same  week  ?  "  Madame,"  I  ex 
claimed,  "it  seems  to  me  that  since  our  bridal  we  have 
had  nothing  but  saddle ;  if  this  goes  on,  I  shall  be  like 
the  horse  that  Motherwell's  pathetic  verse  has  immortal- 


LITERATURE   AND    EDUCATION.  59 

ized.     He  went  forth  in  the  morning,  and  in  the  even 
ing, 

"  Home  came  the  saddle, 

But  he  nevermore." 

Who  has  not  congratulated  himself  on  his  mortality, 
as  he  has  taken  up  his  cup,  filled  with  the  perpetual 
water,  with  its  slight  modification  of  wine,  spirits,  tea 
and  coffee,  and  the  more  palatable  of  these,  prohibited 
by  that  stern  old  moralist,  the  gout,  who  stands  like  a 
country  schoolmaster,  ready  to  mark  the  slightest  devi 
ation  from  soberness,  with  his  inevitable  chalk?  Yet, 
from  this  limited  variety,  Heliogabalus  must  sup,  and 
Lucullus  dine;  and  the  culinary  genius  of  a  Vatel,  who 
kills  himself  because  a  soup  is  too  little  seasoned,  must 
compose  the  dishes  by  which  the  sated  palate  of  a  Louis 
Fifteenth  is  stimulated. 

But  for  the  mind — for  the  intellect — for  the  investi 
gation  of  truth — here,  variety  is  boundless.  Here,  de 
sire  finds  ever  new  changing  food  to  gratify  it.  Here, 
as  bodily  faculties  fail,  and  physical  pleasures  pall,  the 
pleasures  of  the  mind  constantly  increase  in  variety 
and  intensity.  In  the  gratification  of  these  desires,  we 
find  our  minds  created  for  no  finite  bound  of  time,  but 
everything  is  graduated  on  an  eternal  scale. — John  B. 

Felton. 

\ 

39.  THE  REPUBLIC  OF  LETTERS. — The  world  had 
better  lose  all  other  arts  combined  than  to  forget  its  A  B 
Cs.  Sometimes  I  have  thought  of  them  as  of  twenty-six 
soldiers  that  set  out  to  conquer  the  world — rthat  A  was 
an  archer,  and  B  was  a  bugler,  and  C  was  a  corporal, 


60  CALIFORNIA  ANTHOLOGY. 

and  D  was  a  drummer,  and  E  was  an  ensign,  and  F 
was  a  fifer,  and  G  was  a  gunner,  down  to  Z,  who  was 
a  zouave ;  and  these  twenty-six  drill-sergeants  have 
subdued  the  kingdoms  of  the  earth  and  air,  taken  pos 
session  of  the  realms  of  thought,  and  founded  a  repub 
lic  of  which  the  wise  and  noble  of  all  time  are  citizens 
and  contemporaries,  where  their  is  neither  death  nor 
forgetfulness — the  imperial  Republic  of  Letters. 

Again  I  have  thought  of  them  as  of  a  telegraphic 
cable,  laid  beneath  the  waters  of  time,  safe  from  dis 
turbing  storm  and  tempest — so  short,  the  child's  primer 
will  contain  it ;  so  long,  it  connects  the  remotest  ages 
with  the  present,  and  will  stretch  to  the  last  syllable  of 
recorded  time. — Newton  Booth. 

4O.  STYLE. — No  two  styles  are  alike.  They  all 
differ,  and  must  differ,  because  souls  differ.  Style  is  to 
the  matter  as  atmosphere  is  to  the  landscape.  Hang 
a  New  Hampshire  air  over  Florence,  and  is  it  Florence 
still  ?  Strip  the  style  of  De  Quincey  of  its  matter,  and 
it  is  like  taking  the  sound  out  of  a  grove  of  pines. 
No  one  has  yet  sounded  this  mystery  of  a  style — how 
it  is  that  an  item  penned  by  one  man  is  common-place, 
and  the  same  fact  stated  by  another  is  a  rifle-shot  or  a 
revelation;  how  words  locked  up  in  a  form  cap  contrive 
to  tip  a  wink  ;  how  a  paragraph  may  drip  with  the 
honey  of  love ;  how  a  phrase  may  be  full  of  infinite 
suggestion;  how  a  page  may  be  as  gorgeous  as  a  tropi 
cal  landscape,  or  as  cool  as  a  December  day  in  New 
England.  The  style  is  the  man.  There  are  elements 
in  Hawthorne  very  repulsive,  yet  there  is  something 


LITERATURE   AND    EDUCATION.  61 

infinitely  attractive  in  his  purest  artistic  English,  of  a 
higher  order  than  Irving's.  Whittier's  style  is  like  a 
trumpet  sounding  through  his  Quaker  soul.  There  is 
an  advancing  melody  in  all  of  Longfellov/s  handiwork, 
from  the  sweet  sixteen  air  of  his  "  Songs  of  Life,"  to 
the  chapters  of  "  Hiawatha,"  and  his  latest  poem. — 
Thomas  Starr  King. 


THE    PRESS. 

41.  Observe  how  the  outer  bark  of  the  madrono 
and  eucalyptus,  with  the  coming  of  every  summer, 
bursts,  rolls  up  and  falls  to  the  ground,  as  so  much  rub 
bish.  That  is  a  sign  of  expanding  life.  A  great  deal 
of  newspaper  rubbish  to-day  is  a  sign  of  growth.  The 
outer  rind  and  bark  of  things  fall  to  the  ground  by  that 
vital  force  which  is  continually  developing  a  larger  and 
nobler  life  in  the  community.  No  man  will  hereafter 
go  to  the  head  of  this  profession  without  fair  scholar 
ship,  a  wide  range  of  observation,  a  large  capacity  to 
deal  in  a  general  way  with  human  affairs,  and  that  keen 
insight  which  catches  the  spirit  and  essence  of  this  on 
going  life.  Most  difficult  of  all  is  a  certain  power  of 
statement,  which  no  school  can  teach,  and  without  which 
the  highest  plane  of  the  journalist  cannot  be  reached. 
Your  long  story  will  not  be  heard.  The  world  is  wait 
ing  for  the  man  of  condensation.  Tell  it  in  few  words. 
If  you  can  master  this  eclecticism  of  thought  and  state 
ment,  I  know  of  no  more  promising  field  for  a  young 
man  to-day  than  that  of  journalism;  if  one  cannot,  the 
potato-field,  in  a  season  of  blight,  is  quite  as  promising. 


62  CALIFORNIA    ANTHOLOGY. 

The  newspaper  has  been  gradually  encroaching  on 
the  domain  of  literature.  It  has  absorbed  monthly  maga 
zines,  or  forced  publishers  to  resort  to  illustrations— 
to  a  sort  of  picture-book  literature  for  grown-up  child 
ren.  It  has  driven  the  lumbering  quarterlies  into 
smaller  fields,  and  diminished  their  relative  importance. 
The  average  citizen  craves  the  news  from  a  journal 
having  the  very  dew  of  the  morning  and  of  the  even 
ing  upon  it.  It  must  come  to  him  damp  and  limp, 
bringing  whatever  is  best  at  the  smallest  possible  cost. 
The  newspaper  is  the  herald  of  the  new  era.  Its 
errand  must  be  swift,  its  statements  compact,  and  its 
thought  eclectic  and  comprehensive. 

Three  thousand  years  ago,  one  of  the  grand  old 
prophets  spoke  mysteriously  of  the  "living  spirit  of  the 
wheels."  Was  it  other  than  the  modern  newspaper 
thrown  off  by  the  pulsing  of  the  great  cylinder  press  ? 
But  observe,  that  through  yonder  Golden  Gate,  which 
the  sun  and  the  stars  and  the  lamps  of  men  glorify  day 
and  night,  the  devil-fish  comes  sailing  up,  and  is  not 
concerned  whether  his  accursed  tentacula  close  around 
saint  or  sinner.  Is  not  that  the  fullest  symbol  of  a 
public  journal  conducted  by  ignorant  and  unscrupulous 
men  ?  Rather  would  you  not  choose,  as  a  more  fitting 
symbol  of  the  ideal  journal,  one  of  the  small  globules 
of  quicksilver,  which  you  shall  find  on  any  of  these  en 
circling  hills,  so  powerless  to  draw  to  it  an  atom  of 
filth  or  rubbish,  but  ever  attracting  the  smallest  particle 
of  incorruptible  silver  and  gold  ? —  W.  C.  Bartlett. 


LITERATURE    AND    EDUCATION.  63 

42.  The  liberty  of  the  press  is  the  highest  safe 
guard  to  all  free  government.  Ours  could  not  exist 
without  it.  It  is  with  us,  nay,  with  all  men,  like  a  great, 
exulting,  and  abounding  river.  It  is  fed  by  the  dews 
of  heaven,  which  distil  their  sweetest  drops  to  form  it. 
It  gushes  from  the  rill,  as  it  breaks  from  the  deep 
caverns  of  the  earth.  It  is  fed  by  a  thousand  affluents 
that  dash  from  the  mountain  top  to  separate  again  into 
a  thousand  bounteous  and  irrigating  rills  around.  On 
its  broad  bosom  it  bears  a  thousand  barks.  There 
genius  spreads  its  purpling  sail.  There  poetry  dips  its 
silver  oar.  There  art,  invention,  discovery,  science, 
morality,  religion,  may  safely  and  securely  float.  It 
wanders  through  every  land.  It  is  a  genial,  cordial 
source  of  thought  and  inspiration  wherever  it  touches, 
whatever  it  surrounds.  Upon  its  borders  there  grows 
every  flower  of  grace  and  every  fruit  of  truth.  I  do 
not  deny  that  that  river  sometimes  oversteps  its  bounds. 
I  do  not  deny  that  that  river  sometimes  becomes  a 
dangerous  torrent,  and  destroys  towns  and  cities  upon 
its  banks;  but  I  say  that  without  it,  civilization,  human 
ity,  government,  all  that  makes  society  itself,  would  dis 
appear,  and  the  world  would  return  to  its  ancient  bar 
barism.  If  that  were  to  be  possible,  or  thought  possi 
ble  for  a  moment,  the  fine  conception  of  the  great  poet 
would  be  realized.  Civilization  itself  would  roll  the 
wheel  of  its  car  backward  for  two  thousand  years.  If 
that  were  so,  it  would  be  true  that 

"  As  one  by  one,  in  dread  Medea's  train, 
Star  after  star  fades  off  th'  etherial  train, 


64  CALIFORNIA  ANTHOLOGY. 

Thus  at  her  fell  approach  and  secret  might, 
Art  after  art  goes  out,  and  all  is  night. 
Philosophy,  that  leaned  on  heaven  before, 
Sinks  to  her  second  cause,  and  is  no  more. 
Religion,  blushing,  veils  her  sacred  fires, 
And,  unawares,  morality  expires." 

— Gen.  E.  D.  Baker. 


43.  A  free  press  is  the  great  economic  illuminator 
of  politics,  art,  religion,  society,  morals.  It  is  at  once 
the  tribunal  of  taste  and  the  articulator  of  thought.  It 
is  the  handmaid  of  enterprise,  the  fortress  of  order, 
the  mailed,  invincible  right  arm  of  freedom.  Like 
commerce,  it  gives  health  and  vigor  to  the  life  of 
nations;  like  commerce,  its  sceptre  stretches  from  the 
shining  temples  of  the  Orient  to  the  swimming  forests 
of  the  Thames.  Its  shrouds  stiffen  and  its  white  sheets 
fill  with  the  winged  gales  of  progress.  Beating  foam 
ing  paths  through  conquered  waters;  dashing  on  steeds 
of  fire  along  iron  ways;  harnessing  the  elements  to  its 
chariot;  reading  the  mysteries  of  the  magnet;  making 
a  courier  of  the  lightning,  and  guides  of  the  sun  and 
stars,  it  courses  its  way  in  majesty,  in  power  and  in 
glory,  over  a  boundless  sea  of  possibilities,  and  its  do 
minion  broadens  with  every  swell  of  the  tide.  Its 
many-colored  fabric  is  meshed  and  fashioned  in  the  be 
neficent  loom  of  cumulative  emprise,  and  its  shifting 
shuttle  marks  the  pace  of  the  world's  advance. 

— Thomas  FitcJi. 


LITERATURE    AND    EDUCATION.  65 

BOOKS. 

44.  The  distance  of  a  star,  the  age  of  a  planet,  the 
flow  of  history,  the  stones  of  biography,  the  vast  spaces 
of  fiction,  the  richest  music — such  knowledge  and  such 
society  may  be  ours  through  only  a  hundred  books,  with 
a  cultivated  taste;  such  an  altar  may  be  erected  in  our 
memories,  and  such  stately  worshipers  may  face  it  as 
Mrs.  Browning  describes  in  her  "Vision  of  the  Poets." 
The  title  to  such  a  treasure  is  a  taste  for  literature- 
reading  with  rigid  selection  and  exclusion — reading  for 
an  end. —  Thomas  Starr  King. 


4S.  There  are  books  of  fact,  books  of  life,  and  books 
of  art.  The  first  include  the  sciences;  the  second  em 
brace  history,  biography,  and  all  the  inquiries  into  the 
substance  of  truth,  as  regards  man's  proper  conduct  and 
destiny  ;  the  third  comprehend  verse  and  prose,  not 
discussing  abstract  truth,  but  poetry,  the  drama,  and  the 
w^rld  of  fiction.  A  very  few  books  of  the  first  class 
suffice  to  start  us.  But  it  is  a  shame  that  we  know  so 
little  of  what  constitute  the  glory  and  shadow  of  the 
world  we  live  in — geology,  which  opens  the  cellar 
department,  and  astronomy,  which  interprets  the  dome 
of  our  habitation.  The  leisure  evenings  of  a  single 
winter,  devoted  to  the  Connections  of  Mrs.  Somerville, 
to  Lyell's  geology,  Mitchell's  stump  speech  concerning 
astronomy,  Nicoll,  Buckland  and  Gardner  would  so 
stretch  the  mind  that  one  could  not  go  to  business  in  the 

morning,  nor  look  out  at  night  a  moment  at  the  sky, 
5 


66  CALIFORNIA   ANTHOLOGY. 

without  feeling  what  grand  preparation  had  been  made 
for  his  living.  A  traveler  assures  us  that  in  a  certain  part 
of  Liberia  the  people  can  see  the  satellites  of  Jupiter. 
The  great  heads  of  the  Celestial  chapters  that  hint  the 
immensity  of  the  Zodiac  should  always  be  in  memory's 
sight:  and  half  a  dozen  fascinating  books  tell  it  all- 
books  to  be  read  not  as  water  is  poured  out  on  the  sand, 
but  as  it  is  fed  to  the  roots  of  a  tree.  The  deepest 
facts  of  thirty  centuries  may  all  be  sounded  in  the 
leisure  of  a  winter,  so,  at  least,  that  a  twilight  intelli- 
ligence  concerning  them  shall  illuminate  the  memory. 
The  distance  of  a  star,  the  age  of  a  planet,  the  flow  of 
history,  the  stores  of  biography,  the  vast  spaces  of  fic 
tion,  the  richest  music, — such  knowledge  and  such 
society  may  be  ours  through  only  a  hundred  books.— 
Thomas  Starr  King. 


46.  All  healthy  souls  love  the  society  of  trees;  and 
the  mold  which  feeds  them  is  a  better  fertilizer  of 
thought  than  the  mold  of  many  books.  You  see  the 
marks  of  fires  which  have  swept  along  these  mountain 
sides;  here  and  there  the  trunk  of  a  redwood  has  been 
streaked  by  a  tongue  of  flame,  but  the  tree  wears  its 
crown  of  eternal  green.  It  is  only  the  dry  sticks  and 
rubbish  which  are  burned  up,  to  make  more  room  for 
the  giants,  while  many  noxious  reptiles  have  been  driven 
back  to  their  holes.  Possibly  the  wood-ticks  number 
some  millions  less,  but  very  little  that  is  worth  saving 
is  consumed. 

We  shall  need  a  regenerating  fire  some  day,  to  do 
for  books  what  is  done  for  forests.  May  it  be  a  hot 


LITERATURE   AND    EDUCATION.  67 

one  when  it  comes.  Let  no  dry  sticks  nor  vermin 
escape.  Ninety  in  every  hundred  books  which  have 
got  into  our  libraries  within  the  last  half  century  will 
fail  to  enlighten  the  world  until  there  is  one  good, 
honest  conflagration.  Something  might  be  gained 
from  the  ashes  of  these  barren  books;  therefore,  pile  on 
the  rubbish,  and  use  the  poker  freely.  Let  not  the  fire 
go  out  until  some  cords  of  doggerel,  concocted  in  the 
name  of  poetry,  have  been  added  thereto.  The  giants 
will  survive  the  flames;  but  punk-wood,  moths,  and 
wood-ticks  will  all  be  gone. —  W.  C.  Bartlett. 


47.  Guard  against  desultory  reading.  Yellow- 
backed  literature,  poorly-edited  newspapers,  and  bad 
books,  are  the  curse  of  this  age.  A  pyramid  of  such  trash 
is  only  fit  to  be  burned  for  a  light  to  read  a  good  author 
by.  Read  but  few  books,  and  learn  them  well,  and 
affectionate  caressing  will  take  the  place  of  formal 
visits.  We  have  too  many  books  ;  some  of  them  are 
a  curse  to  the  student,  and  contemptible  to  the  critic. 
Select  a  few  of  the  best  writers  of  ancient  and  modern 
times,  and  read  them  well,  and  your  mind  will  be  the 
best  disciplined.  Under  the  wear  and  tear  of  life,  men 
usually  forget  much  that  they  have  read,  because  their 
memories  are  confused  by  irregular  exercises ;  while  on 
the  other  hand,  organized  and  disciplined  memories 
cling  tenaciously  to  their  stock  of  knowledge.  When 
old  age  begins  to  assail  the  mind,  legions  of  acquire 
ments  stretch  themselves  along  the  battlements  of 
memory,  and  dispute  every  inch  of  its  advance;  and 
if  there  is  a  moment  in  man's  eventful  life  when  he  is 


68  CALIFORNIA    ANTHOLOGY. 

grand,  it  is  when  the  treasures  of  the  mind  are  seen 
resisting,  with  unrelenting  vigor,  the  encroachments  of 
decay,  as  the  pulses  cease  in  the  dead  body.  It  is  told 
of  Rumford  that  he  proposed  a  scheme  to  the  Elector 
of  Bavaria,  by  which  he  might  economize  in  feeding  his 
soldiers.  His  plan  was  small  rations,  and  thorough 
mastication,  holding  that  a  crumb,  well  masticated,  was 
better  than  a  pone  untoothed;  so,  a  page,  digested,  is 
better  than  a  book  devoured. — Rev.  T.  H.  B.  Anderson. 


48.  There  are  friendships,  regal  and  rare,  be 
gotten  of  communion  with  authors.  Books  smile, 
salute  and  fraternize;  they  are  courteous,  urbane,  affable, 
friendly  or  fascinating,  as  the  case  may  be.  Their  com 
panionship  is  no  myth  or  figure  of  speech.  Their 
friendships  have  emancipated  many  a  soul  from  the 
thraldom  of  chill  and  bitter  loneliness.  So  viewed, 
how  sacred  is  the  mission  of  every  printed  page!  Shall 
it  carry  health  and  healing,  courage  and  sustenance, 
light  and  melody,  hope  and  aspiration,  or  shall  fever,  or 
apathy  and  gloom  distil  and  drop  from  its  noxious 
sentiments  and  fancies  ?  Happy  they  who,  with  voice 
or  pen,  lubricate  the  jarring  wheels  of  life  by  kindly 
interchange  of  generous  word  or  helpful  message ! 
Who,  casting  aside,  with  generous  gesture,  all  selfish 
considerations,  awaken  by  the  concords  of  their  own 
nature,  music  in  the  hearts  of  others,  until  even  the 
prodigal  in  his  exile  shall  catch  the  far-off  melody  of 
the  home  song,  and  turn  repentant  footsteps  thither. 

—Sarah  B.  Cooper. 


LITERATURE    AND    EDUCATION.  69 

-49.  Literature  may  not  create  character,  but  it  may 
influence  it.  Genius,  a  gift  often  connected  witn  erratic 
fire,  is  ever  hungry  for  intellectual  food;  but  because  it 
has  in  some  cases  floated  down  to  depravity,  is  no  ar 
gument  against  indulging  the  mental  appetite.  Libraries 
open  up  to  us  the  delicate  organization  of  the  brain,  the 
wonderful  formation  of  the  eye,  and  their  perfect  con 
nection,  the  strange  meaning  of  the  hand,  the  scratches 
upon  the  rocks,  the  marvellous  beauties  of  the  flower, 
the  mysteries  of  the  ocean,  the  land,  the  clouds,  the 
air,  and  the  starry  wonders  of  the  heavens. — 77wmas 
Starr  King. 


BO.  The  supreme  privilege  and  advantage  that  so 
ciety  to-day  enjoys  over  society  five  hundred  years  ago, 
is  privilege  of  reading  printed  literature.  Our  educa 
tion  is  conducted  now  by  the  first  masters.  At  college 
we  may  have  had  third-rate  professors,  but  for  a  dollar  or 
two  we  have  at  our  homes  for  professors,  Faraday  to 
teach  us  chemistry,  Goodrich  to  instruct  us  in  Greek, 
Owen  to  read  us  anatomy,  Schlegel  to  explain  the  phil 
osophy  of  literature,  and  Macaulay  and  Guizot  to  read 
lectures  on  the  laws  and  heroes  of  the  last  eighteen 
hundred  years.  Books  are  our  university,  spirits  are 
our  teachers.  All  other  helps  to  our  cultivation  are 
feeble  in  comparison.  To  hundreds  of  thousands  of 
people  the  sky  contains  less  of  celestial  phenomena  than 
an  ordinary  treatise  on  astronomy.  Thousands  of  men 
might  skirt  and  tramp  the  whole  region  of  the  Alps  and 
Andes,  with  eyes  open  too,  and  still  know  less  of  moun 
tains  than  one  learns  on  quietly  reading  the  fourth  vol- 


70  CALIFORNIA   ANTHOLOGY. 

time  of  Ruskin's  "  Modern  Painters."  Though  they 
roamed' with  the  Wandering  Jew,  and  heard  him  by  the 
month  detail  the  course  of  human  events,  they  would 
know,  when  the  last  session  ended,  less  than  on  reading 
Montesqueu's  "  Compend  of  Laws."  The  evenings  of 
a  single  week  in  reading  Agassiz'  "  Essay  on  Classifica 
tion,"  would  discover,  to  a  man  of  average  brain, 
more  knowledge  of  natural  history  than  if,  two  by  two, 
all  the  animals  of  the  globe  were  to  parade  before  him, 
and  when  that  pageantry  had  vanished,  he  were  led  into 
a  museum  where  every  species  of  the  myriads  that 
compose  the  crust  of  the  globe  were  labelled  and  dis 
played. 

Plato  disparaged  books  in  comparison  with  conver 
sation.  They,  said  he,  stand  like  paintings — in  just  one 
form  and  attitude — and  to  all  questioning  return  one  and 
the  self-same  answer.  Now,  it  is  by  the  grace  of  print 
ing  that  we  know  this  saying  of  Plato.  True,  to  know 
a  man  is  greater  than  to  know  the  greatest  book,  yet 
no  talk  with  Milton  would  have  evoked  a  "Paradise 
Lost,"  or  a  "Comus "  from  his  lips.  Had  you  called 
on  Newton,  you  might  possibly  have  heard  him  fret- 
surely  you  would  have  heard  him  talk  no  chapter  of 
queries  as  to  Optics.  If  you  had  called  on  Shake 
speare,  he  might  have  treated  you  to  as  much  sack  as 
you  could  stagger  under,  but  in  the  interview  he  would 
not  take  you  up  to  the  region  of  his  "  Cassio "  and 
"  Imogene,"  or  down  into  the  depths  of  his  feelings. 
Call  on  Thackery  at  London,  and  he  might  entertain 
you  with  his  grievances  at  the  hands  of  the  member  of 
his  club  who  sketched  his  broken  nose  rather  too  dis- 


LITERATURE   AND    EDUCATION.  71 

tinctly,  but  he  would  not  sketch  you  a  Major  Pen- 
dennis.  Dickens,  on  your  call,  would  be  too  busy  with 
domestic  troubles  to  unveil  that  tropical  sea  of  fancy, 
out  of  which  the  Agnes  of  "David  Copperfield"  sprung, 
like  a  new  Aphrodite,  from  the  foam.  It  would  be 
pleasant  to  see  truly  reported  an  hour's  free  conversa 
tion  with  Thomas  DeQuincey,  but  for  six  bits,  one  may 
purchase  his  "Suspiria  de  Profundis,"  and  sink  into  the 
music  of  the  prose,  the  most  rich  and  masterly  since 
Hooker.  You  often  may  have  thought  what  a  privi 
lege  it  had  been  to  live  in  the  time  of  Jesus;  to  hear 
the  sermon  on  the  Mount  fall  from  his  lips,  to  be  pres 
ent  when  he  unsealed  the  eyes  of  Bartimeus,  to  be  on 
the  mount  of  transfiguration  with  him. 

Have  you  considered  that  by  virtue  of  two  hundred 
duodecimo  pages,  we  all  know  more  of  him  than  any 
dweller  in  Canaan,  any  Gallilean,  any  citizen  of  Jeru 
salem  could  have  known  ?  Did  they  who  saw  but 
fragments  of  his  life,  see  more  than  we,  whose  scope 
embraces  all  of  it,  from  the  birth  in  Bethlehem  to  the 
ascent  from  Olives  ?  Was  the  privilege  of  the  woman  of 
Samaria,  who  heard  him  but  briefly,  and  misunderstood 
most  of  what  she  heard,  greater,  or  was  your  privilege 
greater — you  who  hear  what  he  said  at  the  well,  who 
stand  within  ear-shot  of  the  talk  with  Nicodemus  at 
night— who  hear  all  the  parables,  the  promises,  and  see 
him  blessing  little  children  ?  Let  every  one  who  has  a 
taste  for  books  and  music  thank  God  that  he  was  not 
born  earlier.  Books  and  music !  Books  are  music. 
What  was  knowing  Beethoven  compared  with  hearing 
the  Andante  of  the  Fifth  Symphony  ? 


72  CALIFORNIA  ANTHOLOGY. 

If  the  organ  should  grow  conscious,  and  could  play 
of  itself,  what  music  would  it  chatter,  beside  the  flood 
of  harmonies  that  pour  out  from  it  at  some  vesper-time 
when  the  player  to  its  keys  hints  the  thoughts  that 
some  master  has  set  down  in  books  !  It  is  the  chatter 
of  genius  that  we  get  from  their  conversation — the 
earnest,  noble,  stirring  thoughts  we  find  when  we 
sit  down  alone  to  their  books. 

Books  constitute  not  an  Empire,  but  a  Republic  of 
Letters.  Every  steam  engine  looks  to  me  like  a  snort 
ing  democrat.  "Take  a  good  stare  at  me,  I'm  one  of 
the  b'hoys,"  he  seems  to  say.  He  seeks  to  know  north 
and  south,  the  east  and  west.  He  chafes  and  frets  to 
be  running  on  an  excursion  past  Great  Salt  Lake,  mak 
ing  Brigham  Young  fain  to  stop  his  ears  at  the  screech 
ing,  with  the  great  U.  S.  Mail  on  board,  and  the  old 
flag  gleaming  through  the  clouds  that  issue  from  the 
smoke-pipe,  with  no  star  lacking.  Genius  may  be 
miserly,  and  hoard  its  wealth,  but  the  steam  cylinder 
press  screams:  "In  any  nook  or  corner  of  the  land,  is 
there  a  desirable  thing,  let  me  know,  and  you  will  get 
it  cheap  at  your  door  to-morrow.  It  will  give  you  pub 
lic  documents,  fish  out  forgotten  knowledge,  rummage 
private  correspondence,  ransack  creation."  The  man  of 
genius  may  be  mean,  and  wall  himself  in  from  the 
world,  but  the  palace  of  truth  that  he  rears  in  his  se 
clusion  is  as  free  to  the  world  as  St.  Peter's  is  to  the 
poorest  believer  in  Rome.  The  ticket  of  the  Alphabet 
admits  you  and  me. 

When  we  come  to  talk  more  practically  about  books, 
we  see  the  necessity  of  selection.  In  the  Imperial 


LITERATURE    AND    EDUCATION.  73 

Library  at  Paris  (the  largest  in  the  world)  there  are 
eight  hundred  thousand  volumes,  and  one  hundred 
thousand  MSS.  "Art  is  long,  and  time  is  fleeting." 
The  reader  who  had  begun  in  the  reign  of  King  David 
to  read  them,  if  stopped  only  on  Sundays,  to  rest  his  eyes 
and  go  to  church,  would  be  now  about  checking  the 
the  last  volume.  [Spoken  A.  D.  1861.  EDITOR.]  Set 
side  by  side  single  copies  of  all  the  books  that  have 
been  printed,  and  they  would  reach  from  the  vineyards 
of  Los  Angeles  to  the  snowy  beard  of  Mount  Shasta. 
No  man  lives,  no  German  professor,  the  juices  of  whose 
body  are  a  decoction  in  equal  parts  of  tobacco-juice 
and  beer,  can  in  all  his  life-time  read  through  half  the 
volumes  -of  our  San  Francisco  Mercantile  Library. 
A  hundred  volumes  might  be  selected  which,  if  read 
with  care,  during  their  leisure  hours,  would  make  men 
of  average  brains  better  informed  than  are  any,  except 
those  who  are  supereminent  in  knowledge — not  the 
sort  of  specific  knowledge  which  the  great  German 
grammarian  in  Latin  craved,  who,  in  his  old  age,  re 
marked  that  if  he  were  to  live  life  over  again,  he  would 
devote  himself  entirely  to  the  dative  case. — Thomas 
Starr  King. 


NOVELS. 

81.  A  nation's  literature  is  an  index  to  its  civiliza 
tion.  The  cultivation  of  the  study  of  letters  and  a 
high  standard  of  literary  work  are  consequent  upon  the 
refinement  of  a  people.  But  may  not  literature  bear 
to  its  country  some  more  important  relation  than  that 


74  CALIFORNIA  ANTHOLOGY. 

of  a  result  ?  May  it  not  be  a  great  element  of  national 
growth  ?  I  believe  that  literature  is  more  than  a  mere 
accompaniment  of  culture,  that  it  is  a  prime  factor  in 
advancing  culture,  that  it  is  a  proximate  cause  of  civili 
zation,  that  it  may  be  made  a  mighty  motor  in  redeem 
ing  from  sluggishness  and  immorality  the  populace 
when  taught  to  read. 

For  a  clear  understanding  of  the  idea  I  desire  to  il 
lustrate,  consider  civilization  to  mean  the  moral  and 
social  status  of  a  people,  and  literature  to  be  their  learn 
ing  and  their  fancy  preserved  in  writing.  It  is  the  part 
that  the  latter  may  take  in  raising  the  moral  and  social 
condition  of  our  country,  that  we  are  to  regard.  The 
department  of  literature  that  is  most  popular,  and, 
therefore,  is  most  influential  for  good  or  for  ill,  that 
most  earnestly  requires  the  watchfulness  of  those  who 
admire  purity  of  character  among  us,  is  the  department 
devoted  to  fiction.  Of  the  various  writings  of  the  fic 
titious  school,  the  novel  may  be  most  easily  turned  to 
civilizing  humanity,  or  to  pandering  to  its  most  de 
graded  tastes.  The  novel  reflects  the  experiences,  the 
aims,  the  heroism  of  mankind;  it  holds  up  for  sympa 
thy,  emulation  or  contempt,  acts  and  emotions.  All  the 
manifold  springs  of  human  conduct  find  a  source  in  the 
novel.  With  the  novel  the  power  lies  of  spreading 
abroad  a  sense  of  honor  and  of  creating  respect  for 
true  dignity  of  manhood.  It  should  be  life  reproduced, 
not  a  mere  representation  of  the  phases  of  existence, 
but  an  impressive  guide  to  the  grand  purpose  of  living. 

Romances  are  more  numerous  and  of  a  better  order 
in  Great  Britain  than  in  America.  Some  authors  be- 


LITERATURE    AND    EDUCATION.  75 

lieve  that  the  supremacy  of  the  English,  in  this  respect, 
is  due  to  their  systematized  life.  One  writer,  of  observ 
ant  mind,  has  assigned  as  a  reason,  to  which  he  at 
tached  much  importance,  that  in  England  almost  the 
only  readers  of  this  style  of  literature,  are  found  among 
those  who  have  little  to  do,  the  nobility  and  the  wealthy 
classes  ;  that  their  leisure  makes  them  exacting,  and 
their  exactions  must  be  heeded  to  insure  the  author's 
success.  If  this  fact  has  a  tendency  to  perfect  the 
novel,  it  is  entirely  independent  of  the  subject  matter, 
upon  the  treatment  of  which  its  lasting  merit  and 
power  for  usefulness  must  depend. 

The  subject  matter  is  the  life  portrayed.  What  are 
the  distinctive  marks  of  life  in  this  republic,  drawn  by 
lapse  of  time  ?  The  cardinal  principle  of  a  democracy 
is  original  equality.  We  all  start  equals.  It  is  curious, 
but  true,  that  we  claim  equality  with  those  only  who 
have  risen  above  us.  The  endeavor  to  justify  our  pre- 
tentions,  is  one  of  the  causes  of  the  restlessness  pecu 
liar  to  us.  I  do  not  say  that  envy  and  jealousy  actuate 
us  in  seeking  to  better  ourselves.  I  prefer  to  think 
that  it  is  the  possibility  of  improvement  made  manifest 
by  the  achievements  of  others,  that  impels  us  onward. 
But  whatever  may  be  the  inner  motive,  the  outward 
fact  still  remains.  Democratic  life  is  essentially  nerv 
ous,  active,  a  chapter  of  successes  and  reverses.  It  is 
with  the  details  of  this  life  our  novelist  must  deal.  Do 
they  not  present  to  him  a  more  inviting  prospect  than 
the  regulated  order  of  an  aristocratic  existence  ? 

Yet  this  is  the  life  of  which  DeTocqueville  has  said 
that  "nothing  conceivable  is  so  petty,  so  insipid,  so 


76  CALIFORNIA   ANTHOLOGY. 

crowded  with  paltry  interests,  in  a  word,  so  anti-poetic." 
Anti-poetic  let  it  be;  earnestness,  not  poetry,  is  the  es 
sential  of  a  novel.  But  petty,  insipid,  or  crowded  with 
paltry  interests,  never.  Here  the  individual  lives,  here 
man  stands  an  architect  of  fame,  with  his  doubts,  with 
his  passions,  in  the  presence  of  rare  prosperities,  or  in 
conceivable  wretchedness.  These  things  are  real,  they 
are  to  be  the  theme  of  the  novelist's  story.  In  them 
each  one  will  find  something  to  touch  his  sympathy,  to 
make  him  quiver  with  hope  and  exultation,  or  bow  in 
pity.  'Tis  sympathy  moulds  the  most  of  us,  and  es 
pecially  the  lowly.  To  that  the  novelist's  creations 
must  appeal  that  we  may  be  made  to  glow  with  the  in 
spiration  of  manly  purpose  and  with  the  possibilities 
born  of  resolve. 

It  may  be  asked  why  the  novel  has  not  made  its  ap 
pearance  ere  now,  if  it  is  so  well  adapted  to  our  system 
of  living.  In  struggling  to  exist  we  have  had  no  time 
to  look  about  us  and  write;  and  during  our  literary  in 
fancy,  the  literature  of  a  mother-tongue  was  in  its 
prime.  Moreover,  a  literature  can  not  be  built  in  a 
day.  The  true  novel  can  be  drawn  only  by  one  of 
keen  observation  and  wide  sympathies.  I  speak  of  sym 
pathies,  not  alone  towards  one's  fellow  man,  but  towards 
one's  fellow  people.  Until  some  national  feeling  has 
sprung  from  the  formative  existence  of  a  people,  until 
national  traits  are  developed,  in  which  we  all  take  pride, 
we  can  expect  no  one  to  possess  that  subtle  kinship 
with  men  at  large,  requisite  to  the  broad  effective  pur 
pose  of  the  democratic  novel. 

Our  country  has  been  pushed  to  conclusive  heights, 


LITERATURE   AND    EDUCATION.  77 

from  which  she  is  gradually  settling  to  that  stable  condi 
tion  of  society  from  which  alone  prosperity  can  be  evolv 
ed.  The  trials  of  past  years  have  brought  us  to  realize 
that  this  is  not  a  grand  speculation,  but  that  steady,  honest 
exertion  is  the  only  precursor  of  success.  The  presence 
of  schools  in  all  quarters  familiarizes  the  popular  mind 
with  letters.  We  have  had  the  fancies  of  Poe,  the 
natural  beauties  of  Bryant  and  Longfellow,  the  sunny 
mysteries  of  Hawthorne,  and  the  sturdy  purity  of  Em 
erson.  The  time  has  come  in  our  literary  and  historic 
growth  for  the  advent  of  the  novelist.  It  is  for  those 
who  feel  an  interest  in  perpetuating  the  romance  of 
life  and  of  meaning,  to  aid  the  author  in  his  self-im 
posed  task  of  writing  for  the  advancement  of  his  race, 
not  with  the  sole  motive  of  enriching  himself.  He  is 
but  an  artist  who  introduces  into  his  living  pictures  real 
istic  forms.  The  age  is  propitious  to  the  growth  of 
strong  men  and  women,  whom  the  writer  must  copy. 
The  novel,  true  to  the  world  it  represents,  must  have 
much  in  common  with  humanity;  to  be  true  to  itself, 
it  must  turn  this  common  bond  to  the  enobling  of  hu 
manity.  The  quality  of  his  models  and  the  nature  of 
their  thoughts  and  utterances  determine  the  value  of 
the  novelist's  gift  to  his  country.  It  is  for  the  people 
to  furnish  him  with  the  originals  of  those  instructive 
lives  which  he  is  to  present  as  an  example  to  his  read 
ers.  And  especially  is  it  the  duty  of  those  whose 
studies  bring  them  in  contact  with  the  grandest  charac 
ters  of  reality  and  of  fancy,  by  their  private  lives  and 
public  opinions,  to  aid  in  fostering  a  general  spirit  of 
rectitude,  that  the  novelist  may  be  filled  with  it,  and 


78  CALIFORNIA   ANTHOLOGY. 

that  all  may  know  it  and  feel  its  nearness  when  breathed 
upon  from  the  pages  of  the  opened  volume. 

Then  can  the  novel  be  made  to  elevate  the  moral 
and  social  status  of  a  people.  The  companion  of  man's 
quiet  hours,  it  will  speak  to  him  in  his  retirement,  when 
he  can  commune  with  the  thoughts  its  teachings  may 
inspire.  It  will  address  him  without  the  hollow  sound 
ing  of  words  to  mock  the  solemnity  of  what  it  says. 
It  will  have  influence  with  him  because  it  confides  in 
him  privately  and  makes  him  the  unobserved  discoverer 
of  his  own  failings.  It  will  benefit  him,  because  his 
better  nature,  despite  him,  will  be  moved  by  all  that  is 
beautiful  in  its  passages.  In  the  presence  of  the  true 
novel,  man  will  grow  erect  in  truth,  as  the  human  form, 
before  the  figure  of  the  Apollo,  unconsciously  straight 
ens  itself. — F.  P.  Dcering, 


52.  The  monthly  reports  of  our  Mercantile  Library 
show  that  novels  are  as  ten  to  one  of  all  other  books 
read  in  San  Francisco.  It  is  useless  to  quarrel  with 
the  fact,  as  it  is  absurd  to  quarrel  with  any  primal  pas 
sion  of  our  being.  It  is  folly  to  cast  a  slight  on  novels, 
as  a  class.  They  constitute  no  class,  but  a  mighty 
branch  of  literature.  The  English  and  the  German 
novels  differ  as  much  as  a  leopard  and  a  hippopotamus. 
We  are  wont  to  speak  of  English  books,  pervaded  with 
the  Byronic  spirit,  as  the  "  Satanic  "  in  literature;  but 
as  Milton's  fiend  could  find  no  bottom  to  the  abyss,  so 
from  far  deeper  gulfs  than  any*  English  novel  ever 
opened,  we  see  arising  in  the  worst  French  fictions  the 


LITERATURE   AND    EDUCATION.  79 

presiding  demon  of  all  cancerous  corruptions,  issuing 
with  appropriate  odor,  as  if  from  Swedenborg's  excre- 
mentitious  hell. 

Bow  with  me  to  the  genius  of  woman  in  modern 
times,  as  I  call  the  roll  of  the  choicer  works  of  English 
fiction.  Such  creativeness  as  is  displayed  in  the  pro 
duction  of  Charlotte  Bronte  and  the  author  of  "Adam 
Bede,"  has  never  been  known  since  Shakespeare.  A 
library  of  novels  is  like  a  gallery  of  pictures.  One  man 
saunters  through  it  to  see  what  the  pictures  are  about; 
another  sits  down  before  the  master-pieces  to  see  what 
the  artist  was  about;  the  first  sees  the  paint,  the  second 
the  paintings.  It  were  well  if  every  person,  after  read 
ing  a  novel,  were  compelled  to  write  out  or  to  think  out 
the  axis  of  the  whole.  Suppose  some  reading  circle 
should,  at  each  session,  agree  to  settle  on  one  point,  as 
to  show  which  of  all  Scott's  works  exhibits  the  greater 
power;  why  Charles  Reade,  who  is  so  brilliant  in  de* 
scription,  so  graphic  and  unapproachable  in  dialogue, 
can't  sketch  a  character  but  he  must  degrade  both  it 
and  himself;  why  the  close  of  Bulwer's  "  What  Will 
He  Do  with  It  ?  "  is  such  an  unmitigated  piece  of  snob 
bery  that  we  feel  inclined  to  pitch  book  and  author  to 
some  place  where  types  are  never  set  up  more;  why 
Mrs.  Stowe's  "Dred,"  the  first  volume  of  which  is  far 
the  grandest  she  ever  wrote,  in  the  second  volume  runs 
so  swiftly  to  weakness  and  failure ;  why  the  drawing  of 
Rochester  stands  out  more  surprisingly  on  the  tenth 
reading  than  on  the  first;  why  the  author  of  "Adam 
Bede"  is  the  most  eminent  of  living  novelists;  why 


80  CALIFORNIA  ANTHOLOGY. 

each  character  on  her  page  stands  out  like  a  star  against 
the  blue  sky  in  a  clear,  cool  night;  why  the  "Mill  on 
the  Floss,"  though  still  an  able  and  more  bitter  book, 
is  inferior  to  "Adam  Bede."  I  have  often  thought  that 
perhaps  the  pulpit  could  do  no  better  service  than  to 
discourse  faithfully,  once  a  quarter,  on  the  health  or 
disease  of  the  novel  that  all  the  ladies  in  the  parish  are 
just  reading.  It  is  often  remarked  that  when  his  eyes 
are  shut,  man  cannot,  except  by  the  odor,  distinguish 
between  beef  and  mutton,  elk  and  pork.  It  is  no  reason 
why  he  should  not  with  his  eyes  open. — Thomas  Starr 
King. 


EDUCATION  A  SUPREME  DUTY. 

83.  Minds  there  are,  even  in  this  generation,  which 
outvalue,  even  according  to  the  most  material  standard, 
all  the  rest  of  the  world  besides.  The  mind  of  Ericsson 
was  a  fortification  to  the  whole  coast  of  our  country 
in  time  of  war — of  more  worth  than  walls  of  earth  and 
stone,  on  which  millions  have  been  spent.  The  active 
brain  of  Field  set  itself  to  work,  and  Europe  and 
America  became  joined  together  by  an  imperishable 
band,  like  gigantic  Siamese  twins.  The  mind  of  Gari 
baldi  is  Italy's  hope  of  liberty.  The  mind  of  Bismarck 
contains  Germany,  centralized  and  united;  and  the 
traveller,  whether  he  visits  the  cities  or  plains  of  Eu 
rope,  or  ascends  the  Alps,  still  finds  himself  surrounned 
and  enveloped  by  the  intellect  of  Napoleon — dead  half 
a  century  ago. 


LITERATURE    AND    EDUCATION.  81 

Minds  there  have  been  of  so  much  service  to  the 
generation  in  which  they  have  lived,  that  all  the  united 
efforts  of  the  millions  of  their  contemporaries  were  val 
ueless  beside  a  single  reflection  or  a  single  thought  of 
theirs;  and  minds  like  these  may  be  in  the  neglected 
children  around  you.  Is  it  sound  mercantile  sense 
to  waste  a  product  so  rich  and  so  accessible  ?  To  use 
a  California  figure  of  speech,  every  child  has  in  his  in 
tellect  a  mine  of  pay-ore;  every  one  of  these  mines  will 
richly  pay  the  working,  and  sometimes  it  will  happen  to 
you  to  strike  a  pocket  of  intellect  that  will  enrich  your 
whole  generation.  When  such  a  mind  is  lost,  for  want 
of  cultivation,  who  can  tell  how  far  the  advance  of  the 
world  is  retarded  ?  Who  can  say  to  what  point  of  pro 
gress  the  world  would  not  have  attained,  had  it  had 
the  benefit  of  the  well  developed  powers  of  those 
minds  which,  for  want  of  education,  have  been  utterly 
lost  ?  How  grand,  how  swelling  might  have  been  the 
song  of  the  mute,  inglorious  Milton!  How  vast  the 
discoveries  of  some  Newton,  who  has  lived  his  ignoble 
life  with  as  little  reflection  as  the  clod  he  worked ! 
Who  can  tell  but  that  minds  have  lived  which,  if  edu 
cated,  would  have  told  us  the  secret  of  the  birth  of  the 
sun  and  stars,  would  trace  life  to  its  source,  would 
have  opened  new  worlds  to  our  gaze,  and  brought  old 
ones  nearer  together.  I  tremble  as  I  think  how  near 
the  world  was  to  losing  altogether,  for  want  of  educa 
tion,  those  glorious  creations  of  Shakespeare.  The 
accident  that  gave  him  to  us  makes  us  thrill,  as  it  shows 
us  how  many  stately  ships  of  intellect,  which  have  left 

their  native  haven  freighted  to   the  water's  edge  with 
6 


82  CALIFORNIA    ANTHOLOGY. 

the  cargo  for  which  mankind  is  famishing,  have  gone 
down  in  the  darkness  and  the  night.  And  if  you  wish 
that  future  generations  should  know  and  bless  your 
name,  link  it  to  that  of  our  great  University,  from 
whose  loins  shall  spring  the  manly,  stalwart  minds,  of 
which  you  will  be  the  fathers.  Aye,  this  is  true  fame — 
fame  that  lives. — John  B.  Felton. 


III. 

THE  CONDUCT  OF  LIFE. 


PART    III. 


THE  CONDUCT  OF  LIFE. 


64.  DUTY. — God  demands  greatness  of  us  all,  and 
not  goodness  merely.     There  is  not  a  person  so  humble 
or  so  feebly  gifted  that  the  call  is  not  to  him  or  to  her. 
If  we  have  few  qualities  that  can  influence,  and  but  a 
narrow  sphere  to  fill,  still  we  have  ourselves  to  develop 
and  ourselves  to  rule. —  Thomas  Starr  King. 

65.  OUT  of  the  confusion  and  chaos  of  every  un 
finished,  toilsome  life,  an  Eden  may  arise;  light  may 
break  forth.      It  is  a  vigilant  regard  for  little  things  that 
begets  happiness. — Sarah  B.  Cooper. 

66.  BE  PROMPT  in  your  attention  to  professional 
calls,  even  if  they  be  not  urgent,  and  be   punctual  in 
the  fulfilment  of  your  appointments.      He  who  delays 
until  evening  that  which  he  can  and  should  do  in  the 
morning,   carries  a  burden  on  his    mind  all  day   for 
nothing.      It  is  prompt  performance  which  enables  some 
persons  to  accomplish  so  much  more  than  others. 

— Dr.  G.  A.  Shurtleff. 


84  CALIFORNIA    ANTHOLOGY. 

57.  LIFE  SHOULD   BEAR  GOOD   FRUITS. --Let    me 
hope,  for  myself  and  us  all,  that   when   we  have  filled 
out  our  allotted  space  in  this  world;  when  we  are  at 
tended  by  weeping  friends,  for  the  purpose  of  removing 
us  to  our  last  resting  place,  that  it  shall  not  be  said  of 
us  that  we  have  lived  without  purpose,  but  that  we  have 
gathered  friends  in  the  days  of  our  manhood;  that  we 
have  left  fruits  to  bloom  when  we  have  departed. 

—Gen  E.  D.  Baker. 

58.  THE    SEASONS  when   men  are    used  as  pipes 
through  which  to  blow   the   Divine  breath  of  Inspira 
tion  are   short   and   soon  pass    away.      Extraordinary 
success  always   brings  extraordinary  trials  in  its   bril 
liant  train,  which  must  be  met  with  becoming  fortitude. 

—  Thomas  Starr  King. 

59.  IN  MIRTH,  men  are  sincere;  in  sobriety,  hypo 
critical.      It  is  behind  the  mask  of  gravity  that  the  fan 
tastic  tricks  which  turn  and  overturn  society  are  per 
formed.     Joy  is  more  dificult  to    counterfeit  than  sor 
row.     We  may  cloud  the  sun  with  smoked  glass,   but 
we  cannot  dissipate   the   clouds  with  any  telescope  of 
human  invention. — Hubert  H.  Bancroft. 

60.  A  PREMIUM  on  heels  involves   a  discount  on 
heads,  while  a  fair  valuation  of  each  argues  a  healthy 
condition. — Sarah  B  Cooper. 

61.  WE  MUST  be  not  merely  tolerant,  but  liberal; 
and  must  advance  by  the  law,  not  of  antagonism,  but  of 
sympathy.      I  do  not  care  to  acknowledge  as  my  friend 


THE    CONDUCT    OF    LIFE.  85 

the  man  who  is  so  narrow  as  to  see  nothing  good  out 
side  of  his  own  little  clique,  or  party,  or  faith,  or  race. 
I  honor  the  cosmopolitan  soul. — Rev.  W.  E.  Ijams. 

62.  EACH  MAN  is  a  divinely  chartered  corporation, 
to  trade  with  all  nature,  to  enrich  himself  by  commerce 
with  all  that  he  can   reach  by  any  of  his  arts;  and  the 
moment  that  this  commerce  ceases,  he  begins  to   die, 
though  he  may  continue  to  exist  until  all  of  his  stored 
stock  is  exhausted. — Thos.  Starr  King. 

63.  THE  JUSTICE  of  heaven  is  sure  and  unerring. 
Success  may  for  a  season  gild   a  wicked  career,  and 
throw  around  it  a  false  and  illusive  lustre,  yet,  just  as 
certain  as  night  follows  the  day,  retribution   waits  on 
crime.     This  lesson  is  repeated  in  the  pages  of  univer 
sal  history,  is  inscribed  on  the  tombs  of  dead  nations, 
and  written   in  the  experience  of  all  living  men. 

— Frank  Tilford. 

64.  A  DANDY  lives  not  by   the  clock  or  almanac, 
but  from  one  neck-tie  to  another;   a  fashionable  woman 
lives  from  one  wrinkle  to  another;  the  politician  from  one 
Presidential  election  to  another;  the  epicure  from  one 
turtle  to  another;  the  philosopher  from  the  perception 
of  one  principle  to  the  dawning  of  another;  the  phi 
lanthropist  from  one  act  of  charity  to  another. — Thos. 
Starr  King. 

66.  ON  MANY  a  tomb-stone,  where  it  is  written, 
"Here  lies  so-and-so,  aged  seventy  years,"  the  true  in 
scription  would  read,  "In  memory  of  a  soul  who,  in 


86  CALIFORNIA  ANTHOLOGY. 

* 

seventy  years,  lived  about  five  minutes,  and  that  was 
when  he  first  found  himself  in  love." — T/ios.  Starr  King. 

66.  THE  POPULAR  notion  that  a  ghost  is  a    soul 
unclothed   with   a   body,   is   fallacious ;    your    genuine 
ghost  is  a  body  not  vitalized  by  a  soul — a  mere  machine 
for  converting  potatoes  and  meat  into  the  straps  and 
cords   of  humanity.      The  soulless   rich  man  is  mere 
bank  paper  that  adversity  tears  to  shreds.      The  soul 
less  office-holder  is  a  bladder,  which  at  the  expiration 
of  his  term  of  office,  is  pricked,  collapses,  and  tumbles 
out  of  sight.      But  the  dandy  is  entitled  to  stand  in  the 
first  rank  of  ghosts — he  is  a  whiskered  essence,   an 
organized  perfume. —  Thomas  Starr  King. 

67.  IF  MEN,  like  balloons,  could  be  allowed  to  cut 
loose  from  their  bodies,  and  soar  to  their  actual  planes 
of  culture  and  refinement,  we  should  see  some  slinking 
into  the  alleys,  some  rising  into  the  brilliant  sphere  of 
truth,  some  to  the  rosy  realms  of  beauty,  and  some,  the 
selected  band,  into  the  serene  light  of  charity.    It  would 
be  Dante's  dream  again,  the  series  of  circles  narrowing 
down  to  the  base  of  the  pit,  and  circling  with  broader 
sweeps  as  it  rose  to   the  joys  of  Paradise. — Thomas 
Starr  King. 

68.  NOBLE    LIVES. — Life    is   a   channel   of  intel 
lectual  power.     Living  is  a  fine  art.     Great  lives  mean 
more  than  the  noblest  orations.      There  are  facts  in 
Fenelon's   life  that  are  as   rich   and   eloquent  as  any 
passages  in  Shakespeare.     Washington  was  not  felt  as 
a  literary  power;  his  words  do  not  kindle  us;  but  his 


THE    CONDUCT    OF    LIFE.  87 

faith,  decision,  fortitude  did,  and  continue  to.  His 
soul  lived  a  literature  more  terrible  to  despotism  than 
ever  was  penned.  We  speak  of  Cordelia  as  one  of 
Shakespeare's  noblest  creations,  and  Jennie  Deans  as 
one  of  Scott's  richest  productions.  Is  it  any  less  to  be 
a  Jennie  Deans  or  a  Cordelia  than  to  write  her  ?  Is 
the  echo  more  musical  than  the  notes  that  create  it,  or 
the  mirror's  reflection  more  perfect  than  the  face  that  is 
mirrored  ?  If  lives  could  take  outward  shape,  we 
would  learn  better  to  appreciate  their  nobleness. —  Thos. 
Starr  King. 

69.  LET  YOUR  THOUGHTS  GROW.  To  have  beautiful 
thoughts  and  suppress  them,  is  like  destroying  the  seed 
of  a  beautiful  flower.  How  can  you  have  beautiful 
flowers  unless  you  cultivate  and  cherish  them  ?  First 
preparing  the  soil  best  adapted  to  their  growth,  and 
selecting  those  seeds  and  plants  you  wish  to  cultivate, 
you  are  well  repaid  in  beholding  them  spring  up  to  greet 
you  with  beauty  and  fragrance.  How  pleasant  to  see 
homes  decorated  with  those  beautiful  teachers  of  love 
and  purity.  We  can  cultivate  beautiful  thoughts  by  ex 
pressing  such  as  come  to  us,  freely,  without  stint,  with 
out  thinking  how  they  will  please.  When  you  have  a 
train  of  beautiful  thoughts,  be  free  to  speak  them.  It 
may  incline  other  minds  to  new  ideas  which  may  draw 
forth  the  language  of  harmony.  How  many  beautiful 
ideas  have  been  suppressed,  for  fear  of  what  the  world 
might  say — thoughts  that  flow  like  living  waters  from 
the  soul. — M.  J.  Up/mm. 


88  CALIFORNIA  ANTHOLOGY. 

70.  MARRIAGE. — As  we  advance  in  life  the  cordage 
of  kindred  breaks  away.     Aged  parents  drop  in  the 
tomb.    We  know  that  sisterly  fondness,  once  so  earnest, 
has  diverged  into  a  new  channel.     A  husband  and  off 
spring  have  become  the  reservoirs  of  her  affections. 
The    stern    cares    of   life    have    long   ago  solidified  a 
brother's  heart.      It   is  true   we   form   occasional   and 
strong  frienships   with    the    outer    world.      They    are 
rarely  more,  however,  than  companionable  and  mental 
affinites.     They  ruffle  a  little  the  heart's  surface,  while 
the  emotional  depths  are   undisturbed.      There  is  no 
union  and  interblending  of  soul.     In  intercourse  with 
his  fellows,   the  most  communicative  man   reserves  a 
host  of  sensations  and  delicate  sensibilities.     They  are 
the  soft  murmurings  and  dulcet   warblings   from   the 
better  and  purer  portions  of  our  nature.      He  feels  it 
profanation  to  breathe  them  into  the  ear  of  his  dearest 
male  friend.     A  mother  could  sympathize  with  them. 
But  since  she  is  dead  they  have  sunk  back  upon  the 
heart.     They  will  lie  there  forever,  unless  a  loved  and 
confiding  wife  attract  them  forth  by  the  magnetism  of 
a  tender  and  unsullied  soul.      This  unfettered  inter 
communion    of    feeling  is  the    joy  and    rivet   of    the 
marriage  tie.     If  falsehood  or  concealment  intervene  on 
either  side,  a  calamitous   future   will    inevitably    ensue. 

-James    G.  Howard. 

71.  THE  TREE  of  Love  should  have  generous  oppor 
tunity  to  strike  root,  and  gather  strength  and  tenacity, 
before  the  scion  of  marriage  be  grafted  into   it ;   for, 
though  shoot  and  stock  become  thereafter  one  tree,  yet 


THE    CONDUCT    OF    LIFE.  89 

the  graft  determines  the  kind  of  fruit  it  shall  bear.  Be 
fore  marriage,  Love's  Inquisition  should  be  keen-eyed, 
keen-eared,  almost  relentless,  in  ferreting  out  the  subtle 
faults  and  weaknesses  of  the  enthroned  ideal ;  but,  after 
leaving  the  bridal  altar,  all  inquisitorial  robes  should  be 
thrown  aside  at  once  and  forever,  and  upon  the  threshold 
of  every  new  day  should  be  inscribed  the  gentle  sug 
gestion  : 

Be  to  each  fault  a  little  blind; 
Be  to  each  failing  wondrous  kind. 

—Sarah  B.   Cooper. 

72.  OH,  CHARITY  !  friend  of  the  fatherless,  com 
forter  of  the  afflicted !  On  thy  starry  brow  is  stamped 
the  sign-manual  of  the  Omnipotent ;  on  thy  cheek  is 
the  smile  of  heaven;  in  thy  hand  is  the  balsam  of  life. 
Child  of  Christianity!  in  the  quivering  light  that  gleams 
in  thy  glowing  features  are  seen  the  emblems  of  Peace, 
Joy  and  Hope  !  Thy  softening  and  refining  influence 
is  divinely  sweeter  on  the  great  ocean  of  life,  as  it  ebbs 
and  flows  and  beats  upon  the  shores  of  time,  than 
silvery  notes  of  music,  which,  rippling  o'er  the  moon 
light  waves,  ravish  the  delighted  soul  of  man.  What 
pleasant  memories  dost  thou  not  bring  with  thee! 
What  delicate  flowers  dost  thou  not  plant  in  our 
hearts!  What  poems,  filled  with  jeweled  thoughts, 
dost  thou  not  whisper  in  our  ears!  The  pencil  that 
would  paint  thy  beauties  should  be  tipped  with  the  hues 
of  heaven! — Francis  J,  Sullivan, 

73.     THERE  is  no  such  thing  as  infallible  affection. 
From  the  apples  of  discord  is  expressed  the  vinegar  of 


90  CALIFORNIA  ANTHOLOGY. 

hate ;  while  from  the  sweet  grapes  of  kindness  is  dis 
tilled  the  wine  of  perpetual  bliss. — Sarah  B.  Cooper. 

74.  HE  WHO  composes  a  poem  that  has  no  burning 
thought  in  it,  is  not  so  original  as  he  who  constructs  an 
original  mouse-trap.     The    one    is    a    mere  artisan   in 
words,  the  other  an  original  thinker  in  wire  and  wood. 

—  Thomas  Starr  King. 

75.  THERE  ARE  two  classes  of  men  not  to  be  inti 
midated.     They  are  the  saints  who  believe  in  the  "  Love 
of  God,"  and  the  savants  who  believe  in  the  "Reign 
of  Law."    These  two  ideas  are  profoundly  tanquilizing. 
— Rev.    W.  £.  Ijams. 

76.  DISCIPLINE.— 

Upon  the  patient  earth 
A  thousand  tempests  beat, 
To  call  to  life  the  flowers 
That  make  her  glad  and  sweet. 

So,  o'er  the  human  heart 
The  countless  griefs  that  roll 
But  wake  immortal  joy 
To  bloom  within  the  soul. 

— Ina  D.  Coolbrith. 

77.  "THE  BRAVE  DAYS  OF  OLD."— Ah!  talk  not  to 
me  of  living  then  and  now.     We  plume  ourselves,  poor 
fools,  and  say  that  more  of  life  is  given  us  in  the  short 
space  we  run  it  through,  than  was  vouchsafed  our  ances 
tors  a  century  or  two  ago  in  thrice  the  time.      Puffed 
up  by  our  mechanical  contrivances  which  we  call  science, 


THE    CONDUCT    OF    LIFE.  91. 

our  parcelling  out  of  earth  and  ores  which  we  call 
wealth,  our  libertinism  which  we  call  liberty;  casting 
ourselves  adrift  from  our  faith,  calling  in  question  the 
wisdom  and  goodness  of  our  Maker,  throwing  off  all 
law  but  the  law  of  lust,  all  affection  save  avarice  and 
epicurism,  we  plunge  headlong  into  some  pandemonium, 
or  cast  ourselves  under  some  soul-crushing  juggernaut 
of  progress,  and  call  it  life,  and  boast  one  year  of  such 
demoniacal  existence  to  be  worth  ten,  aye  a  hundred,  of 
the  old-time  sort. — Hzibert  H.  Bancroft. 

78.  GREATNESS. — Our  tests  of  the  kinds  of  great 
ness  are   apt  to   be  defective.     The  world   rates  that 
highest  which  upheaves,  demolishes  and  ruins.      If  at 
night  some  constellation  should  suddenly  begin  to  shoot 
out  Bengal  lights,  flooding  the  heavens  with  pyrotechnics, 
the  world  would  look  up  and  admire  the  power  of  the 
Deity;  or  if  some  filibustering  comet  should  kindle  the 
azure  with   flame,   men   would  say,   "Now,   at  last,  we 
see  the  finger  of  God,"   who  never  have   noticed  the 
imperial  bounty  of  the  sun,  and  never  have  admired  its 
unerring  punctuality.      Happily  the  center  of  our  solar 
system    has  no  French  ambition  for  display.      If  the 
sober  sun   would,   it    could   spill  over  sheets  of  flame 
from  its  full  caldron   that  would  wrap  in  fire  the  fifty 
globes  that  it  is  now  content  to  robe  with  verdure  and 
paint  in  flowers.      It  is  a  magnificent  symbol  of  charac 
ter. —  Thos.  Starr  King. 

79.  THE    HUMAN    TEMPLE. — In   physiology,   and 
in  the  history  of  diseases,  you  have  the  image  or  sym- 


92  CALIFORNIA  ANTHOLOGY. 

bol  of  every  spiritual  distemper.  Whoever  deals  with 
the  body  of  man,  deals  with  the  highest  production  of 
the  Divine  Architect  The  Almighty  published  more 
wisdom  in  the  humblest  man  that  walks  the  earth  than 
in  the  solar  system.  Man  is  the  crown  of  matter. 
Whoever  lives  has  stepped  into  a  body  provided  for 
him,  with  no  less  evidences  of  divine  skill  than  were 
displayed  when  He  harnessed  the  forces  of  the  universe. 
Every  pain  that  afflicts  the  body  has  its  symbol  in  the 
sins  that  infest  the  soul;  and  in  the  rhetoric  of  diseases 
you  can  describe  every  trouble  of  the  body  or  of  the 
State ;  there  is  no  single  bad  element  of  the  body  but 
can  be  represented  by  analogy  of  the  body's  sicknesses; 
no  noble  grace  of  body,  purity  of  blood,  elasticity  of 
heart,  or  bounding  pulse,  but  has  its  analogue  in  the 
soul.  Does  not  God,  by  these  crossing  lines,  write  that 
Godliness  and  health  are  inseparably  connected  ? 

—  TJws.  Starr  King. 

8O.  MORALITY  ESSENTIAL  TO  SUCCESS. — A  pure, 
irreproachable  moral  character  is  essential  to  success. 
It  is  the  impregnable  fortress  in  all  the  battles  of  life. 
It  affords  a  sense  of  security  in  every  difficulty,  and 
inspires  a  feeling  of  courage,  self-appreciation  and  reli 
ance,  when  one's  progress  is  assailed  by  the  viler 
elements  of  human  nature.  To  how  many  distinguished 
personages,  to  how  many  public  fiduciaries,  to  how 
many  great  financial  and  business  institutions  might  I 
point,  that,  for  want  of  a  proper  moral  ground-work  and 
solidity,  have  fallen  in  the  very  hour  of  apparent  tri 
umph  !  No  hereditary  prestige,  no  admitted  social 


THE    CONDUCT    OF    LIFE.  93 

elevation,  no  wealth  which  silver  and  gold  represent,  no 
literary  accomplishments,  no  scientific  attainments,  no 
endowment  of  genius,  no  learning  and  skill,  nor  all 
these  combined,  can  secure  the  greatest  possible  profes 
sional  success  without  an  integrity  of  character  which 
shall  command  public  confidence  and  become  a  recog 
nized,  steadfast  quality  of  the  individual.  The  dis 
tinctions  of  public  and  professional  life  only  serve  to 
make  moral  defects,  if  they  exist,  more  conspicuous,  as 
the  polish  of  the  lapidary  on  precious  stones  selected 
for  display,  reveals  the  unsightly  flaws  which  obscurity 
had  concealed. — Dr.  G.  A.  Shurtleff. 

81.  THE  INFLUENCE  OF  EXAMPLE. — The  will  within 
us  is  the  ultimate  fact  of  consciousness;  yet  how  little 
have  the  best  of  us,  in  acquirements,  in  position,  even 
in  character,  that  may  be  credited  entirely  to  ourselves! 
How  much  to  the  influences  that  have  moulded  us! 
Who  is  there,   wise,  learned,   discreet,   or  strong,  who 
might  not,  were  he  to  trace  the   inner  history  of  his 
life,  turn  like  the  stoic  Emperor  to  give  thanks  to  the 
gods,  that  by  this  one  and  that  one,  and  here  and  there, 
good  examples  have  been  set  him,  noble  thoughts  have 
reached  him,  and  happy   influences  have  touched   to 
bless  him  ?     Who  is  there  that  with  his  eyes  about  him 
has  reached  the  meridian  of  life,  who  has  not  sometimes 
echoed  the  thought  of  the  pious   Englishman  as  the 
criminal  passed  to  the  gallows:     "But  for  the  grace  of 
God,  there  go  I." — Henry  George. 

82.  ALL  DOES  NOT  FADE. — The  few  legends  of 


94  CALIFORNIA   ANTHOLOGY. 

the  deluge,  of  God's  providence,  and  a  few  facts  in  the 
writings  of  the  Babylonian  historian  relating  to  the 
kingdom  of  the  Supreme,  have  adhered  to  the  keel  of 
history,  while  the  waves  of  time  have  submerged  almost 
all  beside.  The  acts  of  many  great  warriors,  the  phi 
losophic  speculations  of  sages,  the  big  scrolls  that 
recorded  them,  have  all  perished.  What  a  lesson  for 
us  all!  Earthly  grandeur  and  wisdom  are  mean  and 
rotten  things.  But  acts  of  love  to  God  and  beneficence 
to  our  race  are  glorious  and  eternal.  The  tear  of 
tenderness  in  a  child's  eye  glitters  in  the  sight  of  angels 
in  heaven,  though  the  most  brilliant  words  and  deeds  of 
the  great  appear  at  that  distance  opaque  and  valueless. 
The  secret  sigh  of  a  penitent  heart  is  heard  by  those 
that  surround  the  majestic  throne  of  the  Almighty, 
though  the  huzzas  of  the  multitude,  and  the  explosions 
of  the  field  of  victory  only  shake  the  dull  atmosphere 
above  us,  and  soon  die  away  to  be  heard  no  more. 

—Rev.    William  Spcer. 

83.  CONFLICT  ETERNAL.  -  -  You  enter  a  great 
factory.  You  are  dazed  and  deafened  by  the  din  ar.d 
clangor  of  the  whirling  machinery,  by  the  buzz  of  the 
spindles,  the  clatter  of  the  loom,  the  hiss  of  the  belting, 
the  grinding  of  the  shafts,  the  churning  of  the  engine. 
The  noise  is  disagreeable,  but  it  must  be  tolerated. 
The  noise  is  the  audible  expression,  the  articulate  speech 
of  work.  Stop  the  noise  and  you  stop  the  work. 
And  in  this  seething  sea  of  sounds — this  deli 
rium  of  noisy  tumult,  this  dizzy  maze  of  flashing 
wheels  and  flying  shuttles — there*  is  perfect  order.  The 


THE    CONDUCT    OF    LIFE.  95 

engineer,  with  hand  on  the  throttle  of  the  engine,  sends 
the  pulsing  life  through  every  vein  and  fibre  of  the  vast 
organism.  Every  cog  and  wheel  and  shaft  and  spindle 
becomes  animate.  A  mass  of  raw  material  is  caught 
up  in  the  eddy  of  this  maelstrom  of  mechanism,  and 
comes  out  the  perfected  fabric. 

So  in  human  society,  the  tumult  and  agitation,  the 
strife  and  warfare,  are  but  the  clatter  of  the  machinery, 
the  grinding  of  the  mills  of  God.  Stop  the  racket  in  the 
world's  great  work-shop,  and  you  stop  its  work.  Close 
the  valve  of  the  engine  of  human  progress,  and  the 
silence  of  death  comes  over  the  world.  And  so  the  con 
flict  will  go  on — must  go  on  and  on  forever.  As  long 
as  there  is  growth  there  will  be  agitation.  As  long 
as  there  is  development  there  will  be  friction.  While 
seasons  roll,  the  sun  shines  and  the  stars  glitter, 
there  will  be  the  clash  of  warring  forces.  While  man 
toils,  suffers  and  aspires,  some  vexed  question  will  dis 
tract  human  counsels,  some  knotty  problem  will  per 
plex  the  soul  of  the  student.  When  all  the  questions 
have  been  settled,  when  all  the  problems  have  been 
solved,  when  the  world's  great  debating  school  has 
closed  its  doors  forever,  this  round  earth  on  which  we 
strut  our  brief,  unquiet  existence,  will  have  been  re 
manded  to  the  limbo  of  dead  planets. 

I  cannot  think  even  of  heaven  as  a  place  of  eternal, 
unvarying  rest — a  place  where  saints  in  glory  fold  their 
hands  in  immortal  listlessness;  where  cherubim  and 
seraphim,  angels  and  archangels  pass  endless  aeons  of 
ennuied  existence,  divorced  from  care  and  work.  I 
prefer  to  think  of  it  as  a  place  of  ceaseless  but  blissful 


96  CALIFORNIA  ANTHOLOGY. 

activity,  where  every  "faculty  of  mind  and  soul  finds 
range  for  expansion  and  incentive  to  growth  ;  where 
ransomed  spirits  shall  compete  for  angelic  honors,  and 
press  forward  toward  the  shining  summits  of  the  celes 
tial  Zion. — Samuel  Williams. 

84.  THE  SUSPICIOUS  MAN. — There  is  not  in  the 
world  a  being  more  unfit  to  live  in  it,  to  perform  the 
ordinary  business  of  life,  to  be  successful  in  his  under 
takings,  than  the  man  who  has  become  suspicious  and 
distrustful,  who  attributes  bad  motives  to  acts,  and  who 
has  lost  confidence  in  his  kind.  He  may  have  arrived 
at  his  conclusions  from  a  bitter  experience;  he  may 
have  been  often  cheated  and  deceived ;  where  he  had  a 
right  to  "look  for  gratitude  he  may  have  encountered 
the  cold  look  or  averted  eye;  but  he  has  made  the  mis 
take  of  taking  the  exception  for  the  rule.  He  has 
reasoned  to  himself:  "  Because  I  have  been  deceived, 
man  is  deceitful;  because  I  have  had  kindness  met  with 
ingratitude,  man  is  ungrateful."  What  is  there  for  such 
a  man  to  do  but  to  hang  himself,  like  Timon?  He  is 
but  one;  he  can  not  be  ubiquitous;  he  cannot  always 
wake  and  watch.  How  can  such  a  man  perform  large 
enterprises,  where  trust  in  many  men  is  necessary  ? 
How  can  he  be  a  General,  where  he  must  rely  upon 
the  highest  qualities  in  thousands  ?  How  can  he  be  a 
statesman,  when  he  has  no  faith  that  the  laws  he  frames 
have  any  goodness  in  human  nature  to  address  them 
selves  to  ?  How  can  he  perform  the  slightest  task, 
when  he  stands  on  the  outside  of  the  great  army  of 
mankind,  ready  to  run  at  the  first  sign  of  approach  ? 


THE    CONDUCT    OF    LIFE.  97 

Man  is  so  constituted  that  even  the  intellect  of  Napo 
leon  can  only  work  through  the  brains  and  arms  of  others. 
What  a  feeble -creature  Napoleon  would  have  been  if 
he  had  not  had  implicit  reliance  on  man  !  Instead  of 
such  a  man  drawing  strength  and  inspiration  from 
others,  their  strength  would  be  to  him  a  constant  men 
ace;  their  enthusiasm  would  be  hypocrisy;  their  faces, 
lighted  into  radiance  at  his  approach,  would  be  the 
mask  to  hide  the  malicious,  envious  and  deceitful  heart. 
And  what  is  the  condition  of  him  who  has  failed  to 
gain  the  sympathy  of  his  fellow-men !  How  his  own 
sympathies  wither  and  fade,  deprived  of  the  sunlight 
that  beams  from  other  human  hearts  !  What  fruit  or 
flower  grows  on  the  barren  waste  of  his  intellect?  The 
voice  of  the  heart  becomes  mute  when  it  speaks  to  ears 
that  are  deaf. — John  B,  Felton. 

86.  MEN  OF  THOUGHT  AND  MEN  OF  ACTION. — The 
man  of  action  is  as  necessary  to  the  man  of  thought, 
as  woman  is,  as  a  wife,  toman;  and  either  one  of  them 
is  a  dead  failure  without  the  other.  The  man  of  action 
takes  up  the  living  thoughts  that  have  been  born  from 
the  brain  of  the  thinker,  and  turns  them  into  useful 
things.  Whence  all  our  commerce,  whence  all  our 
practical  science  ?  First  the  great  thinker,  then  the 
practical  man.  I  admire  the  heroism  of  the  men  of 
action.  I  admire  the  bravery  of  the  men  who  will  take 
a  system  of  thought  and  put  it  into  life,  and  make  it 
redound  to  the  glory  of  man.  We  have  glorious  heroes 
in  commerce,  in  agriculture,  and  in  all  the  practical 

affairs  of  life,   and  not  one  is  less  glorious  than  the 
7  *> 


98  CALIFORNIA  ANTHOLOGY. 

other.  The  man  of  action  and  the  man  of  thought 
stand  as  twin-brothers — I  would  say  as  man  and  wife. 
Whence  the  vitality,  the  astonishing  vitality  of  this 
country  ?  Why  is  it  that  in  the  old  lands  people  are  so 
sluggish  ?  It  is  because  the  men  of  action  and  the 
men  of  thought  are  kept  apart,  and  hence  there  are  no 
children,  and  the  man  of  action  providing  no  seed, 
runs  to  seed,  and  the  man  of  thought  piles  up  thought 
that  has  to  wait  probably  hundreds  of  years  for  some 
man  of  action  to  get  hold  of  it.  Here  the  University 
and  the  primary  school  stand  hand  in  hand;  and  it  will 
be  to  our  glory,  showing  us  that  in  the  future  the  man 
of  thought  and  the  man  of  action  will  strike  hands; 
and  the  very  fact  that  on  festive  occasions  we  recognize 
this  relationship,  is  proof  that  in  future  we  are  to  have 
a  magnificent  race — the  thinker  appreciating  the  man 
of  action,  and  the  latter  in  return  appreciating  the 
thinker. — Rev.  J.  H.  C.  Bonte. 

86.  TRUTH. — Make  all  the  deductions  which  you 
will,  and  see  how  much  there  is  left  in  the  nature  of 
man  to  sympathize  with  and  to'  love.  There  is  truth- 
lying  and  deceit  are  but  the  exceptions — and  the  basest 
man  yields  to  a  temptation  and  swerves  from  his  own 
innate  desire  when  he  lies.  The  great  protection  which 
the  law  gives  to  property  and  life  is  based  on  the  gen 
eral  devotion  to  truth  in  men.  In  the  oath  adminis 
tered  to  the  witness,  when  on  the  story  he  tells  hangs 
a  human  life,  the  law,  with  an  experience  taught  it  by 
ages  of  reflection  on  human  nature,  appeals,  and  ap 
peals  with  safety,  to  two  great  attributes  common  to  all 


THE    CONDUCT    OF    LIFE.  99 

men — reverence  and  truth.  Relying  on  man's  love  to 
God  and  his  devotion  to  truth,  the  juryman  renders  his 
verdict  and  the  judge  pronounces  sentence.  Every 
commercial  principle  and  every  rule  of  business  take 
for  granted  and  assume  the  existence  of  original  high 
moral  qualities  in  man.  The  credit  system,  the  prom 
issory  note,  the  trust  in  a  man's  word,  the  relation  of 
servant  to  master,  of  principal  to  his  agent,  all  have 
lying  at  their  base  the  principle  that  when  no  eye  is  on 
him,  when  temptation  to  do  wrong  holds  out  impunity, 
when  interest  conflicts  with  duty,  man's  nature  is  worthy 
of  trust.  Analyze  every  custom  of  society,  and  you 
will  find  that  it  implies  and  assumes  that  human  nature 
is  good,  true,  kind,  benevolent,  full  of  reverence  and 
love.  The  desire  to  please,  love  of  your  kind,  benevo 
lence,  charity,  all  lie  at  the  base  of  the  evening  party, 
the  social  dinner,  the  elaborate  toilet,  the  courteous 
salutation,  the  curtsy  and  bow. — John  B.  Felton. 


HOME. 

87.  Never  is  there  a  home  like  the  home  of  our 
youth;  never  such  sunshine  as  that 'which  makes  shadows 
for  us  to  play  in;  never  such  air  as  that  which  swells  our 
little  breasts  and  gives  our  happy  hearts  free  expression; 
never  such  water  as  the  laughing,  dancing  streamlet  in 
which  we  wade  through  silvery  bubblings  over  glitter 
ing  pebbles;  never  such  music  as  the  robin's  roundelay 
and  the  swallow's  twittering  that  wakes  us  in  the  morn 
ing;  the  tinkling  of  the  cow-bells;  the  rustling  of  the 


100  CALIFORNIA   ANTHOLOGY. 

vines  over  the  window;  the  chirrup  of  the  cricket;  and 
the  striking  of  the  old  house-clock,  that  tells  our  task 
is  done.  The  home  of  our  childhood,  once  abandoned, 
is  forever  lost.  It  may  have  been  a  hut,  standing  on 
the  ugliest  patch  of  ground  the  earth  affords,  yet  so 
wrapt  round  the  heart  is  it,  so  charged  with  youthful 
imagery  is  every  stick  and  stone  of  it,  that  the  gilded 
castle,  built  in  after  life,  with  all  the  rare  and  costly 
furnishings  that  art  and  ingenuity  can  afford,  is  but  an 
empty  barn  beside  it. — Hubert  H.  Bancroft. 

88.  EVERY  MAN  should  own  his  home,  if  he  can. 
That  philosophy  which  tells  a  man  to  drift  on  over  the 
ocean  of  this  uncertain  life  without  a  home  of  his  own, 
is  wrong.  The  man  who  does  not  own  his  home  is 
like  a  ship  out  on  the  open  sea,  at  the  hazards  of  the 
storm.  The  man  who  owns  his  home  is  like  a  ship  that 
has  arrived  in  port  and  moored  in  a  safe  harbor.  One 
man  should  no  more  be  content  to  live  in  another  man's 
house,  if  he  can  build  one  of  his  own,  than  one  bird 
should  annually  take  the  risk  of  hatching  in  another  bird's 
nest;  and  for  my  own  part,  I  would  rather  be  able  to 
own  a  cottage  than  to  hire  a  palace.  I  often  see  men 
eager  to  effect  an  insurance  upon  their  lives,  and  this  is 
well — it  is  right.  But  the  man  who  owns  his  home  has 
effected  an  insurance  upon  his  happiness  and  the  happi 
ness  of  his  family — which  is  as  much  to  him,  if  his 
mind  be  right,  as  his  own,  and  constitutes  his  own.  I 
have  seen  the  homes  of  the  people  in  foreign  lands;  I 
have  heard  them  talk  of  their  condition  and  lot  in  life, 
and  this  is  the  main  theme  of  thought  with  mankind 


THE    CONDUCT    OF    LIFE.  101 

everywhere.  As  I  listened  to  them  I  discovered  how 
it  is  that  the  Switzer,  in  his  hut  in  the  Alps,  where  the 
limit  of  vegetation  is  reached  and  the  winter  storm 
howls  and  rages  around  him,  is  happier  than  the  Italian 
tenant  on  the  beautifui  plains  of  Lombardy,  amidst  the 
bloom  and  fragrance  of  perpetual  summer.  It  is  the 
consciousness  of  the  ownership  of  a  home  which,  no 
matter  how  the  storm  rages,  nobody  can  take  from  him, 
and  which  he  can  make  happy  in  spite  of  the  storm. 
I  would  say  to  every  man,  buy  a  home  if  you  can,  and 
own  it.  If  a  windfall  has  come  to  you,  buy  a  home 
with  it.  If  you  have  laid  up  enough  by  toil,  buy  a 
home.  If  you  have  made  money  in  stocks,  buy  a  home. 
Do  not  let  anybody  tempt  you  to  put  all  your  winnings 
back  into  the  pool.  Take  out  enough  to  buy  a  home, 
and  buy  it.  Put  the  rest  back  if  you  will.  Gamble  on 
it  if  you  must,  but  buy  the  home  first.  Buy  it  and  sell 
it  not.  Then  the  roses  that  bloom  there  are  yours. 
The  jessamine  and  clematis  that  climb  upon  the  porch 
belong  to  you.  You  have  planted  them  and  seen  them 
grow.  When  you  are  at  work  upon  them  you  are 
working  for  yourselves  and  not  for  others.  If  children 
be  there,  then  there  are  flowers  within  the  house  and 
without. — George  Barstow. 

88.  A  MAN'S  HOUSE  should,  and  to  some  extent 
must,  express  the  tendencies  of  his  vital  breath.  Beasts 
burrow  into  the  earth  for  physical  shelter.  A  man,  be 
sides  shelter,  will  hint  his  greatness  in  the  size  of  his 
house,  his  love  of  floral  beauty  in  his  carpets,  his  sweet 
memory  of  the  water-courses  in  his  service  pipes,  his 


102  CALIFORNIA   ANTHOLOGY. 

bounty  in  his  larder  and  his  table.  The  pictures  on  his 
wall,  the  books  on  his  shelves,  his  furniture,  will  have 
some  strong  vascular  ties  to  himself,  and  we  ought  no 
more  to  be  able  to  step  out  of  our  own  houses  into  other 
men's,  and  feel  at  home  there,  than  we  can  step  out  of 
our  skins  into  other  people's.  Like  crabs  and  lobsters, 
which  sweat  their  shells,  our  houses  should  be  the  true 
representations  of  ourselves,  and  should  distinctly  show 
the  shape  of  our  tasks  and  methods  of  life. —  Thomas 
Starr  King. 


CHILDHOOD. 

90.  The  cost  and  care  of  properly  feeding,  cloth 
ing  and  educating  the   child,  are  but  the  price  which 
nature  demands  of  parents  for  the  incomparable  treas 
ure  of  the  child's   love,  honor  and  obedience;  and  just 
in  proportion  to  the  extent  to  which  parents  neglect  or 
refuse  to  pay  this  price,  in  precisely  the    same  propor 
tion  do  they  forfeit  their  right  to  this  inestimable  boon. 

— Zachary  Montgomery. 

91.  SADDEST  of  all  the  sights  of  a  great  city,  such 
as  San  Francisco,  are  the  little  children  of  the  quarters 
where    poverty   hides — saddest    and    most    menacing. 
Pinched,  ragged,  and  dirty;  yet  in  every  little  body  a 
human  soul;    in   every  little   body  latent    powers    that 
might  strengthen  and  bless  society,  but  that  may  only 
awake  to  curse,  perhaps  to  destroy.     Is  it  not  waste  and 
worse  ?  ,  Out  of  just  such  human  stuff  have  grown  earth's 
best  and  noblest;  and  out  of  such  waste  have  come  the 


THE    CONDUCT    OF    LIFE.  103 

vermin  that  have  gnawed,  and  the  wolves  that  have 
destroyed — they  who  have  shattered  the  domes  of 
national  glory,  and  in  palace  walls  given  the  wild  dog  a 
lair.  Who  shall  wrap  himself  up  and  say,  "This  is  not 
my  affair?" — Henry  George. 

92.  WE  SHOULD  begin  laboring  in  the  regions  of 
mind,  muscle,  or  morals,  almost  simultaneous  with  being. 
WTe  prune  the  tree  soon  after  it  lifts  its  head  above  the 
earth's  surface.  The  trunk  is  straightened,  the  extra 
branches  taken  off,  the  soil  around  well  stirred ;  and 
then  we  look  forward  to  the  time  when  we  can  sit  down 
in  its  deep  shade  to  contemplate  the  goodness  of  the 
great  Creator.  So  in  the  physical  development  of  the 
child,  care  and  attention  are  requisite;  wholesome  food, 
warm  clothing,  fresh  air,  and  a  proper  amount  of  exer 
cise.  Unless  these  things  are  provided,  the  child  will 
be  a  dwarf,  unable  to  meet  and  cope  single-handed 
with  the  thousand  ills  that  flesh  is  heir  to.  The  rule 
will  hold  good  in  the  domain  of  mind.  The  parent 
must  direct  the  mind  of  the  child  into  the  right  chan 
nel  ;  give  it  books  to  study  that  refine  and  elevate. 
There  is  a  kind  of  literature  extant  that  is  pernicious, 
more  poisonous  than  the  exhalations  of  a  stagnant  pool, 
spreading  a  blight  over  the  whole  being.  Books  that 
a  few  years  ago  were  not  seen  in  parlors,  are  now  sold 
publicly,  and  read  publicly  by  public  men.  Encyclope 
dist  and  pamphleteer,  philosopher  and  demagogue,  are 
uniting  in  giving  organic  structure  and  form  to  unbelief 
and  impiety,  elevating  them  to  the  dignity  of  sciences, 
and  reducing  blasphemy  to  a  trade.  You  must  begin 


104  CALIFORNIA    ANTHOLOGY. 

with  a  child  before  its  habits  of  life  and  modes  of 
thought  are  fixed ;  then,  if  it  goes  astray,  you  have 
cleared  your  own  skirts.  To  God  it  stands  or  falls. 

— Rev.    T.  H.  B.  Anderson. 


93.  ASCETICISM. — Did  it  ever  strike  you  that  the 
asceticism  of  the  middle  ages,  which  retreated  to  the 
cloister,  content  with  water-cresses  as  a  bill  of  fare,  was 
never   very  fruitful   of  high  and   profound   discourse  ? 
The  philosopher  who  goes  up  into  the  clouds  to  talk, 
and  prefers  gruel  to  trout  before  going,  makes  an  epi 
gastric  mistake.      He  has  taken  in  the  wrong  ballast, 
and  has  omitted  some  good   phosphorescent  material 
which  might  have  created  a  nimbus  around   his  head 
as  he  entered  the  clouds.     A  .mistake  in  the  gastric  re 
gion  leads  to  errors  of  the  head  and   heart.      I  do  not 
know  whether  there  is  any  ground  of  hope  for  a  people 
who  have  not  only  invented  cast-iron  stoves,  but  have 
invented  "help"  in  the  form   of  the  she-Titans,   who 
have  made  a  wholesome  dinner  well-nigh   impossible. 
Death  on  a  pale  horse  is  poetical  enough;  but  death  in 
the  black  stove  of  many  a  kitchen  is  terribly  realistic. 

-W.  C.  Bartlett. 

94.  FRIENDSHIP. — There  is  no  solitude  like  soul- 
solitude.     Often,  to  be  with  the  multitude  is  to  be  most 
alone;  and  sometimes  to  be  most  alone  is  to  enjoy  the 
divinest  fellowship.     Friendship,  the  most  sacred  and 
helpful,  do  not  make  contact  an  absolute  condition  of 
communion  or  ministration.     The  subtle  law  of  sympa- 


THE    CONDUCT    OF    LIFE.  105 

thy  defies  distance;  it  permits  conscious  fellowship  in 
the  most  abject  isolation,  and  evokes  the  glad  and 
grateful  reponse,  "Yet,  I  am  not  alone." 

To  make  a  full  and  perfect  friendship,  there  must  be 
harmony  of  taste,  feeling,  and  aspiration;  the  natures 
must  match  each  other  in  every  faculty.  There  is  such 
a  thing  as  kinship  in  this  regard,  apart  from  that  ten 
derer  sentiment  which  we  call  love.  In  the  selection 
of  its  companionships,  the  soul  is  dominated  by  laws 
all  its  own.  In  every  perfect  friendship  there  is  honest 
comradeship  of  spirit — a  kind  of  duality  in  unity.  The 
surest  guarantees  for  the  perpetuity  and  advantage  of 
such  friendships  are  education,  culture,  character  and 
moral  worth. 

Friendship  of  the  noblest  type  is  love  refined  of  its 
dross,  clarified  and  etherialized  ;  it  is  unselfish,  con 
stant,  self- forgetting.  In  its  devotion  it  disdains  it 
self,  and  in  calamity  it  is  inflexible  as  adamant. — Sarah 
B.  Cooper. 

96.  SYMPATHY. — It  was  my  happiness  once  to 
know  one  of  'the  most  gifted  of  his  race,  and  to  be  ad 
mitted  to  his  intimate  society.  He  had  been,  in  his 
earlier  life  and  in  matured  manhood,  a  lawyer;  but  the 
glory  of  our  great  countryman,  Washington  Allston, 
turned  him  aside  from  the  studies  of  his  youth,  and  in 
his  later  life  he  gave  himself  up  to  Art.  The  noise  and 
bustle  of  the  court,  and  the  angry  contention  of  men 
jostling  each  other  in  their  struggle  for  antago 
nistic  interests,  had  disgusted  him  with  his  fellow-men,  • 
and  so  he  betook  himself  to  a  beautiful  solitary  crag' 


106  CALIFORNIA   ANTHOLOGY. 

overlooking  the  ocean.  I  saw  him  there.  He  showed 
me  his  paintings.  He  made  me  see  and  feel  his  beau 
tiful  conceptions.  I  expressed  my  gratification.  "Sir/' 
said  he,  "I  perceive  that  you  do  not  understand  paint 
ing,  but  your  voice  is  full  of  sympathy.  Often  the 
farmers  come  to  see  me,  and  they  say,  as  they  look  upon 
my  historical  paintings,  on  which  I  have  labored  night 
and  day,  waking  and  sleeping  and  in  dreams,  to  infuse 
life  and  beauty  of  ideal  expression  and  grace,  'why 
don't  you  paint  portraits  ? '  Paint  portraits  !  Why,  the 
idea  makes  me  shudder.  But  then  it  comes  to  me  in 
my  solitude,  clothed  in  a  human  voice,  and  that  a  kind 
one."  <lYes,"  he  continued,  "this  solitary  life  is  a 
chimera.  We  must  see  in  living  faces  that  we  have 
the  sympathy  of  our  fellow-men.  Our  ears  must  drink 
in  their  voices.  Mine  thirst  to  hear  them." 

Sympathy!  WThy,  it  is  when  all  men  sympathize  with 
us  that  we  are  conscious  of  high  powers,  that  courage 
and  hope  nerve  our  arms.  It  is  in  the  crowd,  amid  the 
roaring  of  cannons  and  the  crash  of  wrecks,  but  with 
the  human  voice  in  his  ears,  with  its  answering  hurrah, 
that  the  sailor  cheers,  as  the  waves  stifle  his  utterance, 
and  his  dying  hands  hold  above  the  water  the  still 
lighted  torch,  in  a  last  effort  to  fire  the  gun.  Put  the 
same  sailor  alone  on  the  solitary  raft,  in  the  dark  night, 
upon  the  ocean,  and  the  wind,  as  it  hurls  the  billows 
over  him,  bears  away  but  a  moan  of  agony  and  despair. 

The  real  martyrdom  of  Marie  Antoinette  was  not 
when  the  ax  of  the  guillotine,  in  mercy,  descended.  It 
came  when  in  that  long  march  to  death  she  saw  in  faces 
upturned  in  scorn,  in  balconies  crowded  with  men  and 


THE    CONDUCT    OF    LIFE.  107 

women  deriding  her  agony,  in  the  stern  features  of  the 
soldiers  around,  that  her  kind  had  excluded  her  from 
the  pale  of  sympathy.  From  a  window  above  her,  as 
she  passes  on,  a  mother  holds  out  her  child,  and  the 
little  one  stretches  forth  its  arms,  as  motioning  to  em 
brace  the  dying  queen.  At  that  proof  that  one  kind 
heart,  in  all  that  crowd,  feels  for  her,  the  rigid  features 
relax,  the  set  teeth  open,  the  brow  unbends,  and  the 
stony  eyes  fill  with  tears. 

But  while  a  man  must  have  the  sympathy  of  his  kind 
as  a  necessity  of  his  nature,  to  gratify  a  want  imperious 
as  hunger,  if  he  wishes  to  be  great,  to  have  a  profound 
respect  for  himself,  to  be  constantly  urged  forward  to 
heroic  deeds,  he  must  have  the  close,  intimate,  particu 
lar  sympathy  of  some  class  or  order.  He  must  be 
united  to  men  by  some  peculiar  bond  of  a  common 
absorbing  interest,  by  the  tie  of  some  cause  to  which 
they  all  consecrate  their  lives,  by  the  union  in  a  kindred 
pursuit,  to  which  their  minds  and  hearts  are  wedded. 

In  this  order  must  be  his  life;  to  it  his  affections  must 
be  given  ;  for  each  member  of  it  he  must  cultivate  re 
spect,  and  from  it  he  must  receive  his  distinction  and 
reward.  Is  he  covetous  of  power  ?  He  must  first 
labor  to  make  his  order  powerful,  and  then  strive  to 
wield  himself  its  united  force.  Is  he  anxious  for  the 
respect,  love,  and  admiration  of  his  fellow-man  ?  He 
must  find  it  in  the  respect,  love,  and  admiration  of  the. 
members  of  his  own  profession,  who  are  capable  of 
appreciating  him  ;  and  the  feeling  inspired  among  his 
fellows,  will  extend  itself  to  the  world.  Nor  is  there 
any  danger  that,  thus  merged  in  a  class,  he  will  lose  his 


108  CALIFORNIA    ANTHOLOGY. 

individuality.  On  the  contrary,  by  contact  with  others, 
engaged  in  the  same  pursuit,  by  generous  rivalry,  by 
the  stimulus  which  comes  from  great  deeds  or  discover 
ies  of  kindred  spirits,  his  own  peculiar  power  is  excited, 
developed  and  felt. — John  B.  Felton. 

96.  WHAT  LIFE  MAY  BE. — To  widen  the  compre 
hension  of  what  life  may  be,  consider  that  every  mind 
is  a  digestive  system,  every  sense  an  avenue  or  duct 
for  transmitting  nutriment  from  without  to  the  living 
spirit.  Beauty  is  as  real  a  thing  as  a  flower.  The  corn 
and  market  stuffs  of  the  Saco  valley  go  into  the  grana 
ries  and  cellars  of  but  few  people,  but  there  are  many 
men  out  of  New  England  who  carry  the  slopes  and 
ridges,  the  rocky  tendons  and  the  dome  itself  of  Mount 
Washington  with  them  wherever  they  go.  They  coil 
their  strength  around  the  White  Hills  as  an  anaconda 
coils  about  a  goat ;  they  crush  and  swallow  and  digest 
them,  and  live  on  their  riotous  strength  ever.  What 
Creation  has  poured  of  its  spirit  into  its  deep  notches 
and  gorges,  they  drink  in  as  a  bee  sips  honey  from  a 
flower ;  they  sip  of  it  in  the  honey  of  art.  Look  at  a 
great  picture.  What  is  its  substance  ?  The  canvas  ?  the 
pigments  that  may  be  scraped  off  and  weighed  in  scales? 
Or  is  it  the  suggestion  that  the  painter  has  made  to 
bloom  above  his  group  of  colored  patches,  or  the  saintly 
expression  that  he  has  laid  on  with  his  oils  ?  What 
nature  means  is  more  than  what  nature  physically  is. 
Indeed,  we  are  born  to  live  royally;  to  feed  on  sliced 
stars  and  strata,  and  the  philosophy  of  Bacon. — Thos. 
Starr  King. 


THE    CONDUCT    OF    LIFE.  109 

RICHES. 

97.  I  do  not  know  which  is  the  more  deplorable,  to 
be  without   money  or  to  be   its  slave.      Money  is  the 
best  of  servants,  but  the  worst  of  masters.     As  a  servant 
it  is  the  "open-sesame"  to  all  the  world,   the  master- 
key  to  all  energies,  the  passport  to  all  hearts;  as  a  mas 
ter  it  is  a  very  demon,  warping  the  judgment,  searing 
the  conscience  and  fossilizing  the  affections.     Wrapped 
by  their  cold  silence  in  an  eternal  slumber  deep  as  that 
of  Endymion,  its  victims  are   lost  to  the  beauties   of 
earth  and  the  glories  of  heaven.      Give  me  the  inde 
pendence,  the  command  of  myself,  of  my  time,  my  talents, 
my  opportunities,  that  wealth  alone  can  give,  but  save 
me  from  the  gluttony  of  greed,  the  fetters  of  avarice, 
the  blind  beastliness  and  intellectual   degradation  en 
gendered  by  an  inordinate  heaping  up  of  riches. 

— Hubert  H.  Bancroft. 

98.  If  an  aroma  could  always  attend  gold,  telling 
you  by  what  ways  it  was  gained,   whether  it  was  in 
herited  or  won  by  enterprise  and  skill;  and,  if  earned, 
whether  in  ways  useful  or  hurtful  to  the  higher  interests 
of  society,  there  would  be  no  danger  of  a  mean  worship 
of  money.      If  a  man's  silver  and  gold  told  the  story 
at  once  whether  he  earned  it  in  making  sugar  or  turn 
ing  it  into  liquor — in  raising  wheat  or  in  speculating  on 
it — in  weaving  honest  cloth  or  in  weaving  shoddy,  in 
putting  soles  to  shoes  for  soldiers  or  sham  ones  which 
prove  that  the   makers  hadn't  any  souls  at  all,  money 
would  carry  its  own  judgment  with  it.      In  any  such 


110  CALIFORNIA    ANTHOLOGY. 

system  the  farmer  need  not  fear  to  let  the  aroma  of  his 
money  expend  itself  far  and  wide.  It  would  sprinkle 
the  vvholesomeness  of  winds,  the  perfume  of  blossoms, 
the  strengthening  smell  of  the  soil,  the  fragrance  of 
noblest  uses. — Thomas  Starr  King. 

99.  Next  to  being  born  blind  or  deaf,  or  otherwise 
deformed  or  diseased,  the  greatest  calamity  that  can 
happen  one  is  to  be  born  rich.  The  greatest  calamity 
because  the  chances  are  a  hundred  to  one  that  beside 
becoming  thereby  enervated  in  body  and  mind,  such  a 
person,  when  pricked  by  those  adversities  which  sooner 
or  later  befall,  will  collapse  like  a  blown  bladder.  To 
the  wealthy  of  California  was  given  one  blessing  forever 
denied  their  children:  they  were  born  poor.  They 
were  the  makers  of  their  money;  and  that  in  itself  im 
plies  some  merit,  howsoever  unintellectual  they  were 
satisfied  to  remain,  or  howsoever  immoral  some  of 
them  may  have  become  in  the  operation.  For  a  pas 
sionate  pursuit  of  wealth  is  in  itself  debasing;  but  pas 
sionate  progress  does  not  long  continue.  Not  less  than 
the  unsuccessful,  the  fortunate  in  the  struggle  for  wealth 
die;  and  the  generation  following,  lacking,  peradventurc, 
the  money  grasping  mania,  will  not  exert  itself  as  did 
its  predecessor;  and  to  every  five  hundred  who  ride 
their  father's  fast  horses  to  the  devil,  perhaps  five  turn 
their  attention  to  ennobling  pastimes. 

In  all  the  abnormities  of  moral  economy,  there  is 
none  so  productive  of  evil  as  this  laborless  inheriting 
of  the  results  of  labor.  Nature  nowhere  so  debases 
herself.  The  vine-root  and  the  flower-stalk,  workers 


THE    CONDUCT    OF    LIFE.  Ill 

with  the  invisible  in  life's  great  laboratory,  in  the  subtle 
chemistry  of  their  own  secret  processes,  bring  from  the 
same  soil,  eaeh  after  its  kind,  painted  and  perfurmed 
fruits  and  flowers,  which  are  nature's  riches.  Wealth 
is  the  product  of  labor  applied  to  natural  objects,  and 
to  be  of  benefit  to  the  individual,  must  grow  from  his 
own  personal  efforts.  The  productiveness  of  a  com 
munity  depends  upon  the  knowledge  and  skill  of  its 
members,  rather  than  upon  natural  advantages. 

— Hubert  ff.  Bancroft. 

1OO.  WHAT  is  IT,  canst  thou  tell  me,  Oh  Sidi  Ben 
Hamet,  richest  of  the  rich  men  of  Blida!  What  magic 
influence  is  there  in  money,  that  it  should  change  the 
very  features  of  humanity — that  it  should  beget  twink 
ling  little  eyes  without  a  visible  spark  of  the  divine 
essence  in  them,  and  noses  that  seem  made  to  smell  out 
the  flaws  of  a  sinful  and  erring  world,  that  the  owners 
may  run  up  a  debit  against  their  fellow  creatures — that 
it  should  give  to  the  human  countenance,  intended  by 
nature  to  be  the  mirror  of  the  soul,  such  a  low,  grovel 
ing  and  imperturbable  character — dry  up  the  warm 
blood  of  youth,  stifle  the  noblest  emotions  implanted  in 
the  human  breast,  and  leave  but  the  shell  of  a  man  to 
mock  at  all  that  is  noble,  generous  and  manly  ?  I  hold 
the  doctrine  that,  as  the  features  of  herdsmen  become 
in  the  course  of  time  like  those  of  the  animals  with 
whom  they  associate,  and  married  couples  grow  to 
resemble  each  other  in  a  long  series  of  years,  so  bankers 
and  brokers  begin  after  a  while  to  acquire  a  metallic 
expression  and  a  jingling  tone  of  voice,  as  if  permeated 


112  CALIFORNIA   ANTHOLOGY. 

with  the  sheen  and  essence  of  precious  metals.  A 
gentleman  of  my  acquaintance  in  the  banking  business 
has  a  habit,  when  asked  for  a  small  loan,  of  opening 
his  eyes  and  looking  straight  at  you  without  the  slight 
est  perceptible  emotion  of  sympathy  or  pity.  His  eyes, 
on  occasions  of  this  kind,  bear  a  wonderful  resemblance 
to  a  couple  of  new  ten-cent  pieces — they  stare  at  you 
with  a  quiet  assurance,  but  give  no  indication  of  any 
thing  hopeful  or  pleasant.  But  what  matters  it,  O, 
Sidi  Ben  Hamet,  thou  richest  of  the  rich  men  of  Blida, 
that  you  have  plenty  of  money  and  I  but  little  ?  Have 
you  not  plenty  of  trouble  too  ?  Do  you  never  get  the 
toothache  ?  Are  you  exempt  from  gout  ?  Can  you  eat 
more,  drink  more,  or  wear  more  than  just  enough,  with 
out  paying  the  penalty  in  some  shape  or  other  ?  Do 
you  think  your  wealth  makes  you  independent  ?  On 
the  contrary  don't  you  feel  that  it  makes  you  a  slave  ? 
You  have  to  stay  by  your  coffers  and  your  specula 
tions,  or  you  lose  your  all. 

You  know  no  such  thing  as  freedom.  It  is  only 
happy-go-lucky  vagabonds  like  us  who  can  claim  to  be 
independent.  We  can  travel  and  see  the  world  ;  we 
can  skim  the  cream  of  it,  and  leave  you  thin  milk. 
Having  nothing  to  lose,  we  have  no  concern  about 
losing  it.  A  little  satisfies  us — just  to  be  able  to  keep 
moving,  seeing,  hearing  and  enjoying;  whilst  with  you, 
O  Sidi !  the  rust  of  care  is  ever  gnawing  upon  your 
vitals.  When  you  have  accumulated  millions,  what 
will  you  do  with  it  ?  As  you  brought  nothing  into  this 
world,  so  you  can  take  nothing  out  of  it.  What  a 
pleasant  subject  of  contemplation  it  must  be  for  a  rich 


THE    CONDUCT    OF    LIFE.  113 

man  on  his  death-bed!  A  life  worn  out  in  toil  and 
trouble  to  accumulate  money ;  a  dozen  graceless  scamps 
waiting  impatiently  for  him  to  die,  that  they  may  pounce 
upon  it  and  spend  it  gloriously !  Well,  the  Creator  has 
balanced  these  things  very  nicely,  it  must  be  admitted. 
Neither  you  nor  I  could  do  it  so  well,  with  all  our 
boasted  sagacity,  O  sublime  and  potent  Sidi  Ben 
Hamet ! — J.  Ross  Browne. 

INTEMPERANCE. 

101.  IT  is  the  grand  overruling  factor  in  insanity. 
It  is  the  great  Nihilist  and  Communistic  agitator  of 
rational   government.     The  whisky-bottle   is   the  gun 
used  to  force  the  ballot  box,  and  its  aim   threatens   to 
be  fatal  to  that  order  which  is  Heaven's  first  law. 

— Dr.  A.  B.  Stout. 

102.  Intemperance  is  the  great  recruiting  officer 
in    the  employment  of  ignorance,   crime,  insanity  and 
suicide.     The    system   of  manufacturing  drunkards  is 
fostered  by  by  our  man-making  and  man-ruling  govern 
ment  with  care,  energy  and  efficiency,  as  though  a  thor 
oughly    manufactured    and    confirmed    drunkard   were 
worth   to   society  two    ordinary  sober    men.     But    no 
sooner  is  the  human  reduced  to  and   below  the  grade 
of  the  brute,  than  the   law  and  courts   and   executive 
officers  treat  him  accordingly. — Gen.  John  A.  Collins. 

103.  IN  THE  brawny  chest  and  muscular  arm  oi 

Heenan  there  is  something  to  admire,  something  more 
8 


114  CALIFORNIA   ANTHOLOGY. 

than  a  mere  idea;  and  the  battering  of  a  human  face  is 
not  half  so  disfiguring  as  the  traces  of  one  night's 
orgie.  Milton  has  made  fiends  interesting,  and  even 
murder  and  war  may  be  woven  into  readable  shape ; 
but  there  is  no  room  in  Milton's  Pandemonium  for  so 
debased  a  form  as  the  Demon  of  Alcohol — a  form  more 
sickening  than  the  grizzly  terror  which  guarded  the 
portal  of  Hell! — Thomas  Starr  King. 

1O4.- 

"  DRUNK,  your  Honor,"  the  officer  said; 

"  Drunk  in  the  street,  sir" — She  raised  her  head. 

A  lingering  trace  of  the  olden  grace 

Still  softened  the  lines  of  her  woe- worn  face; 

Unkempt  and  tangled  her  rich  brown  hair; 

Yet  with  all  the  furrows  and  stains  of  care — 

The  years  of  anguish,  and  sin,  and  despair, 

The  child  of  the  city  was  passing  fair. 

The  ripe,  red  mouth  with  lips  compressed, 

The  rise  and  fall  of  the  heaving  breast, 

The  taper  fingers,  so  dimpled  and  small, 

Crumple  the  fringe  of  the  tattered  shawl, 

As  she  stands  in  her  place  at  the  officer's  call. 

She  seems  good  and  fair;  seems  tender  and  sweet — 

This  fallen  woman,  found  drunk  in  the  street. 

Does  the  hand  that  once  smoothed  the  ripple  and  wave 
Of  that  golden  hair,  lie  still  in  its  grave  ? 
Are  the  lips  that  once  pressed  those  red  lips  to  their  own, 
Dead  to  the  pain  of  their  smothered  moan  ? 


THE    CONDUCT    OF    LIFE.  115 

Has  the  voice  that  chimed  with  the  lisping  prayer, 
No  accent  of  hope  for  the  lost  one  there, 
Bearing  her  burden  of  shame  and  despair  ? 

Drunk  in  the  street — in  the  gutter  found, 
From  a  passionate  longing  to  crush  and  drown 
The  soul  of  the  woman  she  might  have  been; 
To  throw  off  the  weight  of  a  fearful  dream, 
And  awake  again  in  the  home  hard  by — 
The  wooded  mountain  that  touched  the  sky, 
To  pause  awhile  on  the  path  to  school, 
And  catch  in  the  depths  of  the  limpid  pool, 
Under  the  willow  shade,  green  and  cool — 
A  dimpled  face  and  a  laughing  eye, 
And  the  pleasant  words  of  the  passers  by. 

Ye  men  with  mothers,  and  sisters  and  wives, 

Have  ye  no  care  for  these  women's  lives  ? 

Must  they  starve  for  the  comfort  ye  never  speak  ? 

Must  they  ever  be  sinful  and  erring  and  weak — 

Tottering  onward  with  weary  feet, 

Stained  in  the  gutters  and  drunk  in  the  street  ? 

— Daniel  O'Connell. 

1O5.  THE  VICE  OF  SMOKING. —  Of  the  three 
methods  of  using  tobacco,  that  of  smoking  has  insinu 
ated  itself  most  extensively  among  the  youth  of  this 
country,  and  is  the  most  hurtful  use  that  can  be  made 
of  the  weed.  Tobacco,  employed  in  this  way,  being 
drawn  in  by  the  breath,  conveys  its  poisonous  influences 
to  every  part  of  the  lungs.  There  the  noxious  fluid  is 
absorbed  in  the  minute  spongy  air  cells,  and  has  time 


116  CALIFORNIA   ANTHOLOGY. 

to  exert  its  pernicious  influence  on  the  blood — not 
vitalizing,  but  vitiating  it.  The  blood  imbibes  the  stimu 
lant  narcotic  and  circulates  it  through  the  whole  system. 
It  produces,  in  consequence,  a  febrile  action  in  persons 
of  delicate  habits,  where  there  is  tendency  to  weakness 
and  the  tubercular  deposit  in  the  lungs.  The  debility 
of  these  organs,  consequent  on  the  use  of  tobacco,  must 
favor  these  deposits,  and  thus  the  seeds  of  consumption 
are  sown.  This  practice  impairs  the  taste,  lessens  the 
appetite,  and  weakens  the  power  of  the  stomach  greatly. 
The  prevalence  of  a  craving  thirst  among  smokers  can 
be  traced  to  its  action  on  the  lungs,  because  the  nicotine 
is  there,  instead  of  in  the  stomach.  The  liquors  that 
are  drank  do  not  alleviate  the  thirst,  but  rather  aggra 
vate  it.  It  is  time  medical  testimony  was  turned  to 
this  point,  and  the  great  danger  pointed  out  that 
threatens  to  make  us  a  nation  of  Sybarites  and  pigmies. 
The  use  of  tobacco  disturbs  the  regular  pulsation  of  the 
heart.  Tobacco  users  are  thus  hourly  in  danger,  and 
often  suddenly  fall  dead.  The  habit  weakens  the  mind, 
enfeebles  the  memory,  paralyzes  the  will,  produces 
morbid  irritability,  diseases  the  imagination,  deadens 
the  moral  sensibilities,  and  is  continually  an  assault  and 
battery  on  the  nervous  system,  the  intellect  and  the 
soul. — Dr.  R.  H.  McDonald. 


LABOR. 

1O6.     If  the  world  owes  you  a  living,  why  does  it 
not  owe  a  living  to  every  one  ?     And  if  to  every  one, 


THE    CONDUCT    OF    LIFE.  117 

by  the  sweat  of  whose  brow  should  that  living  be  made? 
The  world  owes  no  one  a  living. — A.  S.  Hallidie. 

107.  RESULTS  DIE  ;  agencies  are  eternal.      Merit 
lies  not  in  possession,  but  in  capability.      In  measuring 
a  man,  the  wise  ask  not  what  has  he,  but  what  can  he 
do  ?     If  labor  is  not  better  than  the  reward,  then  life  is 
a  sad  failure  ;   for,  after  a  life  time  of  labor,  of  all  that 
we  acquire,  we  can  carry  nothing  with  us  out  of  the 
world. — Hiibert  H.  Bancroft. 

108.  As  NATURE'S  laws  are  immutable,  and  work 
is  nature's  law,  the  law  of  work  is  immutable.     Philoso 
phers  talk  of  success  and  its  conditions.     Success  has 
no   condition   but  one,   that   is   work.       Honest,    well- 
directed  effort   is  as  sure  to   succeed  as   the  swelling 
rivulet   is  sure  to  find  for  itself  a  channel.      Let  the 
young  man  take  heart,  have  patience,   and  persevere, 
laboring  not  as  in  the  presence  of  a  task-master,  whom 
to  defraud   of  time  or  faithfulness   were  a  gain ;   but 
remembering  that  every  good  deed  is  done  for  him 
self,  and  makes  him  stronger,  healthier,  wiser,  nobler, 
whether  performed  in  the  dark  or  in  the  broad   light  of 
open  day. — H.  //.  Bancroft. 

109.  MAN'S  PRIMAL  home  was  the    abode  of  all 
loveliness.     The  heavens  were  his  roof,  and  never  was 
any  so  curiously  ceiled  and  painted;  the  earth  was  his 
floor,  and  never  was   any  so  richly  inlaid;  the  shadow 
of  the  trees  was  his  retirement,  under  them  were  his 
dining  rooms,  and  never  were  any  so  finely  hung.    The 
air  was  balmy  and  loaded  with  fragrance;  there  was  no 


118  CALIFORNIA   ANTHOLOGY. 

gloomy  back-ground  to  the  picture,  and  a  long  perspec 
tive  of  coming  happiness  stretched  before  him.  Here, 
amid  this  scene  of  beauty,  aisled  above  and  pillared 
about,  he  was  to  live,  to  love  and  labor.  If  our  proto- 
parents,  with  the  light  of  immortality  streaming  through 
every  avenue  of  their  souls,  were  called  upon  to  labor, 
then  we  may  rest  assured  the  great  Author  of  our  being 
intended  we  should  toil  with  our  head,  heart  and  hands. 
In  the  objective  world  we  see  a  thousand  things  that 
prompt  us  to  action.  The  grass  grows ;  the  flowers 
bloom;  the  oak  expands;  the  rivers  run;  and  the  stars 
shine  forever.  In  life,  the  pulsations  of  the  heart  never 
cease;  and  I  have  often  thought  man  should  draw  a 
lesson  of  labor  from  this  emblem  of  our  energy.  It  is 
the  Creator's  drum  beat,  the  reveille,  arousing  mind 
and  muscle  to  enter  upon  the  march  of  life. — Rev.  T. 
H.  B.  Anderson. 

11O.  THE  HUMAN  mind  once  urged  in  activity  is 
as  nervous  as  the  waters  of  the  ocean.  Like  those 
waters,  its  purity  and  strength  lie  in  constant  motion. 
If  it  stagnates,  rank  smells  arise  and  filthy  animalcule 
swarm.  It  becomes  an  effervescing  pool,  breeding 
corruption  and  mental  infusoria.  The  sole  remedy  to 
melancholy  with  intelligent  persons  is  constant  employ 
ment  of  the  mind.  A  big  grief  will  sometimes  dash  upon 
the  soul  as  a  Switzer  avalanche.  It  racks  and  tears  it 
with  its  absorbing  magnitude  and  weight.  Divert  the 
mind  by  employment,  and  the  stupendous  grief  melts 
away  like  that  avalanche  beneath  a  vernal  sun.  When 
a  new  fit  of  melancholy  seizes  you,  betake  yourself  to 


THE    CONDUCT    OF    LIFE.  119 

labor  and  you  will  endow  it  with  wings.  It  will  fly 
away.  Jefferson  and  the  elder  Adams  led  tumultuous 
and  earnest  lives.  They  were  immersed  from  child 
hood  in  most  arduous  toil.  They  both  died  merry  old 
men,  because  philosophical  thought  succeeded  the  throes 
of  political  labor.  They  baptized  till  their  death  in  the 
font  of  continuous  toil.  The  baptism  dispelled  the 
impurities  of  melancholy.  Bonaparte,  in  his  latter 
days,  moped  and  mused  in  idleness.  He  died  the 
most  wretched  of  men.  He  should  have  written  his 
life  and  not  droned  it  into  the  dull  ears  of  others. 
Benton  was  found  busy  when  smote  by  the  Great 
Reaper.  Youth  and  prime  struggle  for  a  season  of 
rest.  It  is  the  maddest  of  fallacies.  The  very  struggle 
ingrains  habits  that,  in  pause,  will  produce  misery  and 
death.  It  is  no  wonder,  in  this  view  of  the  subject, 
that  an  affluent  and  unavaricious  man  pursues  the  game 
of  accumulation  until  the  undertaker  bundles  his  old 
body  into  the  cemetery.  The  fiend  of  melancholy 
would  overtake  him  in  a  rustic  villa  and  retirement. 
His  repose  and  happiness  are  in  labor.  Every  organ 
of  his  body  is  in  fierce  labor.  Even  in  dream-land  the 
mind,  rudderless,  toils  away. — James  G.  Howard. 

111.  MAN,  THE  individual,  is  in  himself  a  force, 
an  independent  force;  and  the  earth  has  just  so  many 
forces  as  it  numbers  living,  thinking,  acting  men;  for 
even  in  this  day  of  unexampled  effort,  many  exist  who 
do  not  live ;  many  are  sentient  who  do  not  think  ;  many 
concern  themselves  with  manifold  affairs  who  do  not 
act.  Beforetime,  men  were  thought  for  by  their  rulers, 


120  CALIFORNIA  ANTHOLOGY. 

and  thus  became  mere  agents  of  a  despot's  will;  now,  in 
the  general  heritage  of  independence,  man  has  discerned 
his  right,  nay,  his  divine  prerogative,  of  thinking  for 
himself.  No  longer  moping  in  the  thrall  of  tyranny,  or 
reft  of  the  free  franchise  of  opinion,  he  has  risen  into 
the  full  stature  of  his  manhood,  realized  the  magni 
tude  of  his  capacity,  and  in  that  knowledge  verified  the 
true  nobility  of  labor;  of  labor  in  its  highest  form;  the 
union  of  the  physical  and  mental,  labor  of  the  sinewy 
arm,  labor  of  the  burning  brain.  He  whose  vocation 
is  mechanical,  is  prompted  to  employ  his  hours  of 
leisure  in  the  cultivation  of  the  mind;  he  whose  pur 
suits  are  mental,  to  invigorate  his  frame  by  frequent 
action.  And  thus  while  mind  and  body  act,  react  upon 
each  other  with  reciprocal  intensity,  man,  the  lord  of 
creation,  though  "fallen  from  his  high  estate,"  without 
a  fetter  on  his  tireless  wing,  is  rising  higher,  higher,  in 
his  flight  towards  the  stars. — Joseph  W.  Winans. 

112.  UNTIL  THE  horizon  of  our  intelligence  uplifts 
and  opens  into  a  clearer  Beyond,  let  the  Here  and  Now 
chiefly  occupy  our  thoughts. 

Here  and  now,  I  say,  then,  it  is  in  work  itself,  rather 
than  in  the  accomplished  result,  that  the  true  benefit  of 
labor  lies.  We  have  been  wrongly  taught;  nor  is  this 
the  only  instance  wherein  our  teachers  need  instructing. 

Of  all  laws  that  environ  us,  and  they  are  legion,  not 
one  is  more  palpable  than  that  by  the  exercise  of 
organs  and  faculties  alone  they  develop. 

In  this,  science,  philosophy,  religion,  and  common 
sense  agree.  It  is  the  pivot  upon  which  all  progress 


THE    CONDUCT    OF    LIFE.  121 

turns,  the  central  principle  alike  in  universal  evolution 
and  in  individual  development.  Organs  and  organisms 
improve  according  to  use.  The  blacksmith  does  not 
acquire  strength  to  swing  his  hammer  by  running  foot 
races;  nor  does  the  logician  become  proficient  in  subtle 
reasoning  by  counting  money  or  selling  bacon.  Bind 
a  limb,  and  it  withers;  put  out  one  eye,  and  the  other 
performs  the  work  of  two.  Mind  and  muscle  alike 
grow,  improve,  acquire  strength  and  elasticity,  only  by 
exercise.  Little  is  expected  of  the  man  who,  in  youth, 
was  never  sent  to  school,  or  required  to  work.  So 
obvious  is  this  that  it  is  hardly  worth  discussing;  and 
yet  this  fact  proved,  all  is  proved. — H.  H.  Bancroft. 

113.  BEFORE  LABOR  in  itself  ceases  to  be  beneficial, 
the  whole  economy  of  nature  must  change.  The 
inherent  energy  of  man  is  significant  of  his  laborious 
destiny.  So  nature  groans  under  redundant  energy, 
with  here  and  there  convulsive  throes.  Surrounding 
us  is  a  universe  seeking  rest.  This  seeking  is  the 
normal  condition  of  affairs ;  for  rest  only  brings  a 
desire  for  fresh  activity.  Bodies  in  motion  labor  to  be 
quiet;  bodies  at  rest  labor  to  be  in  motion.  So  labor 
is  the  normal  condition  of  man,  both  his  will  and  his 
necessity.  If  he  wills  not  to  labor,  necessity  drives 
him  to  it ;  if  necessity  is  absent,  the  spirit  of  good  or 
the  demon  of  evil  stirs  him  to  the  accomplishment  of 
he  knows  not  what.  Absolute  rest  once  found,  and 
chaos  were  come  again.  Activity  is  nature's  rest,  God's 
rest,  and  man's  only  rest.  What  is  absolute  repose  but 
death  ? 


122  CALIFORNIA   ANTHOLOGY. 

By  work  the  universe  is,  and  man.  Nature  hinges 
on  it;  by  it  worlds  are  whirled  and  held  in  place,  winds 
blow,  and  the  fertilizing  moisture  is  lifted  from  the 
ocean  and  dropped  upon  the  hills;  by  it  instinct  is,  and 
intellect  is  made,  and  soul  implanted;  by  it  grass  grows, 
flowers  bloom,  and  the  sunbeam  enters  my  window,— 
else  how  without  work  should  it  have  come  so  far  to 
greet  me. 

If  then  to  labor  is  nature's  mandate,  the  reward 
being  no  less  certain  if  I  obey  than  the  punishment  is 
sure  if  I  fail,  what  folly  for  me  to  look  for  a  miracle  in 
my  behalf,  and  expect  to  reap  the  finest  fruit  of  labor, 
which  is  improvement,  not  wealth,  never  having  plowed 
nor  planted ! — H.  H.  Bancroft. 


CONFLICT  AS  AN  ELEMENT  OF 
PROGRESS. 

114.  Man  is  a  fighting  animal.  About  the  first  thing 
he  does  on  coming  into  the  world  is  to  double  up  his  fists 
and  strike  a  belligerent  attitude.  He  is  never  so  happy 
as  when  harrying  his  weaker  fellow,  never  so  much  at 
home  as  when  in  the  arena  of  tumult.  His  history  on 
earth  is  a  little  else  than  a  record  of  strife  and  conten 
tion,  of  violence  and  bloodshed.  The  first  born  of  the 
race  was  a  murderer;  and  his  descendents,  from  that 
hour  to  this,  have  followed  war  as  a  business  and  peace 
as  a  pastime.  Indeed  there  seems  to  be  a  law  of  con 
flict  running  through  all  nature.  We  read  there  was 
once  a  war  in  Heaven,  when  Lucifer,  son  of  the  morn- 


THE    CONDUCT    OF    LIFE.  123 

ing,  organized  a  revolt  against  the  Lord  of  Hosts. 
Everywhere,  from  the  beginning  of  the  world,  the 
strong  have  preyed  upon  the  weak — the  powerful  have 
crowded  the  feeble  to  the  wall.  The  struggle  for  exist 
ence,  by  which  the  strongest,  if  not  the  fittest,  survives, 
is  a  permanent  factor  throughout  all  organic  life.  Agi 
tation,  tumult,  the  warring  of  repellant  forces,  the 
clashing  of  alien  elements,  the  ferment  of  inharmo 
nious  constituents,  these  seem  to  be  the  order  of 
nature,  the  spur  and  potency  of  progress.  Thus  has 
the  world  been  builded;  thus  has  man  advanced  from 
the  primitive  condition  to  his  present  exalted  state. 
Every  atom  of  living  matter,  from  the  flower  at  our  feet 
to  the  farthest  star  that  glitters  in  the  heavens,  obeys 
this  primal  law.  This  law  prevails  not  only  in  the 
domain  of  action,  but  in  the  domain  of  ideas.  Every 
thought  that  has  thrilled  the  world,  and  set  the  pulses 
of  men  beating  with  joyous  ecstasy,  has  met  a  counter- 
thought,  opposing  and  warring  against  it — a  counter- 
current  of  adverse  opinion.  Every  scheme  of  progress, 
every  movement  towards  human  advancement,  every 
revolution  in  the  direction  of  human  culture,  has  been 
opposed  by  counter-forces,  fought  at  every  step  by 
hostile  principles,  buffeted  by  the  waves  of  adverse 
criticism ;  and  the  more  vital  the  principle,  the  more 
thorny  its  path  of  progress  ;  the  more  sacred  the  truth, 
the  more  persistent  the  opposing  error.  Yet  when  the 
battle  is  ended — when  the  roar  of  the  conflict  is  over, 
it  is  found  that  the  truth  has  survived  and  the  error 
perished. 

Conflict  is  not  only  a  condition   but  a  necessity  of 


124  CALIFORNIA   ANTHOLOGY. 

growth.  It  is  the  vital  impulse  that  gives  to  growth 
its  brawn  and  vigor.  There  can  be  no  growth  that  is 
steady  and  lasting,  no  growth  of  strong  and  well-knit 
fiber  without  the  stimulus  of  resistant  forces.  It  is  the 
fierce  baptism  of  fire  that  gives  to  the  steel  blade  its 
temper,  its  keen,  biting  edge,  its  spotless  lustre.  The 
storm  that  uproots  the  feebler  children  of  the  forest, 
calls  out  the  latent  vigor  of  the  oak.  The  weak  must 
perish,  in  order  that  the  strong  may  have  room  to  grow. 
The  feeble  must  succumb  in  the  great  struggle,  else  by 
the  fatal  inheritance  of  weakness,  life  would  degenerate, 
species  perish,  and  the  survival  of  the  unfittest  ensue. 
Were  the  world  perpetually  at  peace,  the  world  would 
relapse  to  chaos. 

This  is  the  method  by  which  nature  works  largely, 
at  least  in  the  physical  universe.  The  grim  handiwork 
of  conflict  is  visible  all  around  us.  Look  at  these 
majestic  hills  that  bend  so  grandly,  yet  so  lovingly,  over 
this  peaceful  scene.  What  is  the  story  they  tell  ?  A 
story  of  war  and  tumult,  of  titanic  forces  meeting  in 
the  shock  of  elemental  battle.  Over  their  now  verdant 
slopes,  what  fierce  floods  have  swept — around  their 
sunlight  summits,  what  baleful  fires  have  played!  The 
earthquake  and  the  volcano,  the  lava  and  the  ice  flow 
—the  seething  hell  of  internal  fires — the  remorseless 
glacier  grinding  and  crashing  its  way  to  the  sea — - 
upheavals  of  primeval  tufa — convulsions,  cataclysms— 
a  wild  derlirium  of  lawless  forces  struggling  for  ascend 
ency. 

All  this  time  nature  knew  just  what  she  was  about. 
She  worked  persistently  toward  a  definite  end,  to  the 


THE    CONDUCT    OF    LIFE.  125 

accomplishment  of  a  definite  result.  She  was  prepar 
ing  the  soil,  tearing  up  the  old  roots,  blowing  up  the 
old  stumps,  burning  up  the  old  under-brush,  destroying 
the  rubbish  of  an  effete  and  useless  past  that  had  served 
its  day  and  done  its  work,  in  order  to  make  room  for  a 
higher  order  of  material  and  sentient  existence.  She 
struck  the  plow  share  deep  into  the  soil;  she  sent  the 
axe  crashing  to  the  heart  of  the  quivering  tree;  so  that 
this  new  garden  of  the  Lord  should  be  so  thoroughly 
tilled  that  all  eyes  would  delight  in  its  beauty,  and  all 
hearts  be  gladdened  by  its  productiveness.  And  if  the 
the  heavens  and  the  earth  shook  with  the  blows  of  the 
great  husbandman,  it  was  that  golden  harvests  might 
crown  these  smiling  slopes,  that  grass  might  grow  and 
flowers  bloom  and  broad  spreading  branches  of  trees 
give  shelter  to  man  and  brute. 

I  have  no  doubt  that  during  this  bit  of  garden  mak 
ing  there  was  a  good  deal  of  unpleasant  disturbance. 
The  noise  must  have  been  peculiarly  exasperating  to 
the  original  inhabitants.  The  splinters  and  rocks  must 
have  been  flying  about  in  a  manner  intensely  trying  to 
weak  nerves.  There  can  be  no  question  that  many  a 
rash  silurian  citizen,  that  many  an  incautious  plesiosaurus 
and  too  curious  ichthyosaurus,  who  crawled  out  to  see 
what  the  row  was  about,  got  badly  hurt.  Just  as  in 
our  day,  when  there  is  lively  work  going  on,  the  fossils 
who  get  in  the  way  of  the  world's  workers,  come  to 
grief. 

So  in  the  moral  world.  The  law  of  conflict  moves 
through  all  the  tortuous  mazes  of  human  history. 
There  is  no  growth  without  upturning  of  the  soil. 


126  CALIFORNIA   ANTHOLOGY. 

The  ground  must  be  plowed  and  harrowed  before  the 
seed  is  sown.  The  wastes  of  nature  must  be  reclaimed 
before  fruitful  harvests  can  bless  the  labor  of  the  hus 
bandman.  Not  only  must  the  soil  be  prepared,  but  the 
refuse  must  be  destroyed.  The  smoke  and  smutch 
may  be  disagreeable,  may  fill  the  air  with  noisome 
smells  and  dim  the  brightness  of  the  sun,  but  they 
must  be  endured.  The  wise  tiller  knows  that  the  more 
thorough  the  burning  up  of  the  waste  matter,  the  better 
for  the  ground  and  the  richer  the  harvest. 

Regarded  in  this  light,  the  drama  of  human  events  is 
no  longer  a  chaos  of  incongruous  incidents.  It  acquires 
unity,  harmony,  consistency — it  moves  with  an  almost 
rhythmic  order.  Every  act  and  scene,  every  episode 
and  incident,  has  a  place  and  a  purpose.  What  seem 
disorder,  confusion,  tumult,  strife,  are  but  manifestations 
of  forces  moving  in  the  track  of  Law.  They  have  their 
places ;  they  perform  their  part  in  the  economy  of 
nature.  They  are  normal  factors  in  the  problem  of 
human  development.  Instead  of  being  hindrances, 
they  are  spurs  to  progress.  Instead  of  retarding,  they 
assist  civilization.  Sometimes  they  appear  as  symp 
toms,  giving  warning  of  disease,  indicating  its'  nature 
and  pointing  to  its  seat.  Sometimes  they  are  active 
manifestations  of  growth — the  riotous  coursing  of  warm, 
rich  blood  through  a  healthful  organism.  Sometimes 
they  act  as  checks  on  too  rapid  growth,  repressing 
abnormal  development — the  engineer  putting  on  the 
brakes  to  lessen  the  speed  of  the  train.  Sometimes, 
though  rarely,  they  are  merciful  agents  of  destruction 
— destruction  of  what  is  unfit  to  live,  of  what  should 


THE    CONDUCT    OF    LIFE.  127 

and  must  perish;  the  great  gardener  pulling  up  the 
weeds  in  order  that  the  thrifty  plant  may  grow  and  the 
fragrant  flower  bloom. 

It  is  true,  there  are  periods  of  apparent  decay, 
periods  when  the  world  seemingly  not  only  stops  grow 
ing,  but  goes  back — the  pendulum  sweeping  a  revers 
ing  arc  toward  the  black  void  of  barbarism.  Some 
times  an  age,  sometimes  an  era,  is  offerred  up  a  sacri 
fice  on  the  altar  of  progress — is  made  vicariously  to 
suffer,  that  other  and  happier  ages  may  grow  and  pros 
per;  but  even  here  all  is  not  lost.  In  the  cataclysm  of 
the  Dark  Ages,  when  civilization  disappeared  and  the 
human  intellect  itself  seemed  to  perish,  all  was  not 
waste  and  ruin.  Down  in  the  gloom  of  those  sunless 
centuries  forces  were  silently  at  work;  the  seeds  of  a 
higher  civilization  were  slowly  germinating.  If  the 
earth  refused  the  boon  of  fruit  and  flower,  was  it  not 
because  the  soil,  exhausted  by  the  excesses  of  the  past, 
was  taking  a  rest  ? 

Let  it  be  understood  that  nothing  that  is  worth  sav 
ing  is  wholly  lost.  Only  the  dross  perishes,  the  pure 
gold  shines  with  perennial  lustre.  From  the  wrecks  of 
past  systems,  from  the  debris  of  dead  powers  and  prin 
cipalities,  some  germ  of  living  truth,  some  grain  of 
seed  to  fructify  in  other  soils,  is  saved.  The  receding 
wave  leaves  some  precious  spoil  on  the  strand.  The 
Great  Builder  tears  down,  that  he  may  build  better. 
He  demolishes  the  old  rookeries  to  make  room  for  re 
gal  structures.  Ideas  are  indestructible  as  matter.  A 
great  thought  never  dies;  once  it  has  gone  forth  to  the 
world,  it  moves  on  its  shining  way  forever.  It  may 


128  CALIFORNIA   ANTHOLOGY. 

seem  to  go  out  in  darkness;  it  may  disappear  for  ages; 
but  it  comes  back,  like  the  dove  to  the  ark,  with  bless 
ings  on  its  wings. — Samuel  Williams. 

115.     LESSONS  OF  THE  HOUR.— 

There  are  a  few  sweet  lessons  that  to  me 

Have  been  as  fruitful  isles,  and  hights  of  palm 

To  sailors  shipwrecked  on  the  foodless  sea; 

Have  been  as  midnight  stars,  as  winds  of  balm, 

As  songs  of  birds  who  know  the  skies  are  near; 

And  these  few  leaves  of  hope  I  cluster  here. 

. 

First,  Courage,  for  no  grief  a  man  may  find 
But  that  some  earlier  one  the  same  hath  borne 

With  quiet  lips,  tho'  all  his  friends  were  blind.     . 

Thro'  earth's  laments,  and  laughters,  tears  and  scorn. 

We,  who  now  tread  the  floor  of  living  days 

Must  bear  ourselves,  nor  heed  men's  blame  nor  praise. 

Next,  Labor,  Labor — on  this  pivot  move 

The  endless  forces  of  the  living  earth; 
Whatever  thrills  with  strong  desire  and  love 

The  hearts  of  men;  all  deeds  of  deathless  worth 
Were  wrought  by  toilers — never  man  yet  bent 

To  a  great  task,  and  found  his  life  misspent. 

Last,  Faith,  because  so  often  we  have  found 
A  breath  of  heaven  in  the  fragrant  air, 

A  Love  unnamed,  a  pulse  of  crystal  sound, 
A  waking  hope  when  all  the  days  were  fair, 

A  clearer  sense  of  growth  from  less  to  more, 
A  sound  of  waves  along  an  unseen  shore. 


THE    CONDUCT    OF    LIFE.  129 

Pause  here  to  question— shall  the  men  to  come 
Have  faith,  and  worship  with  a  purer  grace, 

And  stronger  than  ourselves  ?     The  years  are  dumb, 
And  no  clear  answer  falls  from  any  place; 

We  shape  the  future — but  we  hardly  know 
With  what  result,  for  long  doubts  trouble  so. 

Yet  we  hear  voices,  and  new  fervors  creep 

Through  all  the  soul  from  some  unknown  profound; 

A  guerdon  and  a  promise  from  the  deep 
Whereof  all  future  is ;  it  is  the  sound 

Of  armies  in  the  distance  strong  and  calm, 

Making  the  darkness  melt  with  their  heroic  psalm. 

It  is  the  voice  of  men:  we  helpers  here, 
Who  shape  the  coming  age  as  plastic  clay, 

Know  that  a  mystic  light  is  creeping  near. 

The  sweet  world,  furrowed  by  the  flame  of  day, 

Throbs  into  rosy  gold,  the  night  wears  fast, 
And  better  men  shall  toil  when  we  are  past! 

Yea!  these,  the  generations  yet  to  be, 

Shall  drop  their  plummets  down  the  wrinkled  walls 
Of  dim  abysses — sail  the  northern  sea,— 

Read  mystic  languages  in  buried  halls; 
Or  whisper  through  the  lucid  breath  of  stars 

In  bright  converse  with  Jupiter  and  Mars. 

— Charles  H.  Skinn. 


IV. 


RELIGION  AND  THE  FUTURE  LIFE. 


PART    IV. 
RELIGION  AND  THE  FUTURE  LIFE. 


116.  ALL   GENIUS   is    FRAGMENTARY.     God   is  at 
once  the   perfect  artist,   the    perfect  poet,   the   perfect 
machinist,  dramatist,  moralist  and  sovereign — as  deep 
and  perfect  in  one  as   in  another,   and  in  each  and  all 
alike,  infinitely  accomplished. —  rfhos.  Starr  King. 

117.  CHRISTIANITY,  by  asserting  and   emphasizing 
the  intrinsic,  inherent  and  immense  value  of  every  soul, 
laid  the  foundation  for  the  doctrine  of  Equal  Rights. 

— Rev.  W.  E.  Ijams. 

118.  IT  HAS  taken  even  Christians  a  long  time  to 
learn  the  real  glory  of  their  own   faith.        Each   new 
creed  has  marked  the  progress  of  thought,  and  the  final 
creed  remains   to   be  written.     We    have,    after    1800 
years,  mastered  only  the  Alphabet  of  Christianity. 

—Rev.  W.  E.  Ijams. 

119.  ALONG  ALL  the  line  of  ages,  we  see  but  one 
character  who  ever  dared  to  tell  all  the  truth  of  a  sin 
ning  nation,  and  our  ear  catches,   over  the    lapse   of 
eighteen  centuries,  the   cry  that  greeted  his  reforming 
voice — a   nation's    cry    of    "Crucify  him  ! "-  —  Edward 
Tompkins. 


132  CALIFORNIA    ANTHOLOGY. 

12  O.  PEOPLE  SAY  to  me,  "  but  St.  Patrick  was  a 
Catholic."  What  is  that  to  me  ?  I  only  ask,  what  was 
his  life  ?  I  get  behind  all  such  narrowness.  What  did 
he  accomplish  for  his  race  ?  For  my  part,  I  look  for 
ward  to  beholding  a  grand  Valhalla  of  the  nations,  in 
which  I  shall  see — yonder,  say  Massillon;  over  there, 
John  Bunyan,  the  Quaker;  there,  John  Wesley;  there, 
Blaise  Pascal,  a  Jansenist  priest;  by  his  side,  it  may  be, 
John  Knox;  and  here,  the  Unitarian,  Thomas  Starr 
King.  And  yet,  withal,  I  am  a  true  Methodist. 

— Rev.  Dr.  Titos,  Guard. 

121.  THE  BELIEF  IN  GOD  is  an    inevitable   part  of 
our  human  nature;    it  is  born  with  us,   it  is  a  universal 
belief;    we  cannot  be  brothers  without  having  a  com 
mon  father.      However  much  a  man  may  persuade  him 
self  that  he  believes  there  is  no  God,  when  he  is  con 
fronted  with  his   own  soul,   he  knows  and    feels  that 
God  exists.      If  there  is  no  God  to  whom  we  owe  our 
common  origin,  what  relation  can  exist   among  men  ? 

-John  B.  Felton. 

122.  EMOTIONAL  RELIGION. — Keep  out  of  the  so 
ciety    of    sickly  sentimentalists,   and   dreamy,    morbid 
enthusiasts.     Our  friends  ought  to  be  people   of  good 
common  sense,  and  honest  and  open  moral  principles. 
The  religion  of  "Gush"  is  not  the  religion  to  carry  us 
through  any  great  crisis.     Conscience,  and  not  emo 
tion,  is  what  we  require. — Rev.    IV.  E.  Ijams. 

123.  DECLINE  OF   ORTHODOXY.  —  The    old  ortho 
doxy  is  virtually  dead.     You  can  still  find  it  in  books. 


RELIGION    AND    THE    FUTURE    LIFE.  133 

It  still  lives  in  printed  creeds,  but  it  has  received  so 
broad  an  interpretation  as  to  be  really  a  new  thing 
under  the  sun.  Not  one  minister  in  a  thousand  preaches 
the  old  creeds  as  they  were  preached.  The  preaching 
is  better  than  the  creed,  and  let  us  hope  that,  by  and 
by,  ministers  will  be  honest  enough  to  change  their 
creeds,  so  that  preaching  and  creed  shall  be  in  complete 
and  even  liberal  harmony. — Rev.  W.  E.  Ijams. 

124.  HOLINESS  THE  END  OF  HUMAN  LIFE.  — 
If  holiness  is  the  beauty  and  perfection  of  the 
Divine  Nature,  surely  it  is  also  the  beauty  and 
perfection  of  human  nature.  The  v/hole  work  of  man 
on  this  earth  is  to  restore  or  perfect  the  Divine  image 
in  the  nature  of  man — in  the  reason  of  man  as  truth,  in 
the  heart  of  man  as  love.  Now,  it  is  the  harmonious 
combination  of  all  these  Divine  features  that  constitutes 
the  beauty  of  the  Divine  image,  or  holiness,  in  man. 
Holiness,  therefore,  is  the  true  end  of  human  life,  and 
every  other  is  false.—  Prof.  Jos.  LeConte. 

126.  FOREKNOWLEDGE  OF  GOD. — Man,  short-sighted 
and  finite,  changes  or  improves  his  original  plan,  from 
time  to  time,  as  unforseen  contingencies  arise.  But  God, 
foreseeing  and  foreknowing  the  end  from  the  beginning, 
every  possible  contingency  is  included  and  provided  for 
in  the  original  conception.  The  whole  idea  of  that 
infinite  work  of  art  which  we  call  nature,  is  contained 
in  the  first  strokes  of  the  Great  Artist's  pencil,  and  the 
ceaseless  activity  of  the  Deity  is  employed  through 
infinite  time  only  in  the  unfolding  of  the  original  con 
ception.  Can  we  conceive  anything  which  so  nobly 


134  CALIFORNIA   ANTHOLOGY. 

illustrates   the  all-comprehensive   fore-knowledge    and 
the  immutability  of  the  Deity? — Prof.  Joseph  LcContc. 

126.  THE  INNER  LIFE. — So  many  of  us  there  are 
who  have  no   majestic    landscapes  for  the    heart — no 
gardens  in  the  inner  life !     We  live  on  the  flats,  in  a 
country  which    is  dry,  droughty,  barren.     We  look  up 
to  no   hights  whence    shadows  fall   and  streams   flow, 
singing.     We  have  no  great  hopes.     We  have  no  sense 
of  infinite  guard  and  care.     We   have   no  sacred  and 
cleansing  fears.     We  have  no  consciousness  of  Divine, 
All-enfolding  Love.     We  may  make  an  outward  visit 
to  the  Sierras,  but  there  are  no  Yosemites  in  the  soul. 

—  Thos.  Starr  King. 

127.  THE  WORDS  OF  CHRIST. —  History,  until  of 
late,  has  been  mostly  a  record  of  battles,  many  of  which 
had  no  effect  upon  society.      But  history,  truly  written, 
will  show  that  the  hinge-epoch  of  centuries  was  when 
no  battle  sound  was  heard  on  the  earth — when  in  Gali 
lee  one   was   uttering  sentiments   in  a  language  now 
nowhere  spoken,   never  deigning  to  write  a  line,  but 
entrusting  to  the  air  his  words.      The   Caesar  whose 
servant  ordained  the  crucifixion — all  the  Caesars — are 
dust;  but  His  words  live  yet,  the  substantial  agents  of 
civilization,   the  pillars  of  our  welfare,  the  hope  of  the 
race. — Thomas  Starr  King. 

128.  THE  CHURCH  ESSENTIAL  TO  THE  NATION. — 
The  true  life  of  a  nation  is  moral.     The  church  is  set 
as  the  spring  of  that  life.    To  her  it  is  left  to  promulgate 
the  doctrines  from  which  moral  apprehensions  arise  and 


RELIGION    AND   THE    FUTURE    LIFE.  135 

moral  principles  are  evolved.  She  is  commissioned  to 
hold  aloft  true  standards,  and  radiate  the  light  of  swift 
and  strong  rebuke  upon  sin  in  low  and  high  places. 
While  the  church  lives  the  nation  cannot  die.  The 
light  of  the  "city  set  on  a  hill"  cannot  be  hidden  or  ob 
scured  from  without;  it  must  decline  and  darken  from 
within.  A  perversion  of  religion  must  both  precede 
and  accompany  every  devastating  overflow  of  de 
pravity. — Rev.  M.  C.  Briggs. 


IMMORTALITY. 

129.  The  mysteries  of  the  other  world  are  not  re 
vealed.     The  principles  of  judgment,  the  tests  of  ac 
ceptance,  and  of  the  supreme  eminence,  are    unfolded. 
Intellect,  genius,    knowledge,  shall  be  as  nothing  be 
fore    humility,  sacrifice,  chanty.      But  in  the  uses   of 
charity,  the  fiery  tongue,  the  furnished  mind,  the  un- 
quailing    heart    shall   have   ample   opportunities,    and 
ampler  than  here.      Paul  goes  to  an   immense  service 
still,  as  an  Apostle;    Newton,  to   reflect   from  grander 
heavens  a  vaster  light. — Thos.  Starr  King. 

130.  THE  SOUL    is   not  a  shadow;    the    body    is. 
Genius  is  not  a  shadow;    it  is  a  substance.      Patriotism 
is  not  a  shadow,  it  is  light.      Great  purposes,    and  the 
spirit  that  counts  death  nothing  in  contrast  with  honor 
and  the  welfare  of  our  country — these  are  the  witnesses 
that  man  is  not  a  passing  vapor,  but  an  immortal  spirit. 

—  Thos.  Starr  King, 


136  CALIFORNIA    ANTHOLOGY. 

131.  THE  YEARNING  FOR  A  FUTURE  LIFE  is  natural 
and  deep.  It  grows  with  intellectual  growth,  and  perhaps 
none  really  feel  it  more  than  those  who  have  begun  to 
see  how  great  is  the  universe,  and  how  infinite  are  the 
vistas  which  every  advance  in  knowledge  opens  before 
us — vistas  which  would  require  nothing  short  of  eter 
nity  to  explore.  But  in  the  mental  atmosphere  of  our 
times,  to  the  great  majority  of  men  on  whom  mere 
creeds  have  lost  their  hold,  it  seems  impossible  to  look 
on  this  yearning  save  as  a  vain  and  childish  hope,  aris 
ing  from  man's  egotism,  and  for  which  there  is  not  the 
slightest  ground  or  warrant,  but  which,  on  the  contrary, 
seems  inconsistent  with  positive  knowledge. 

Now,  when  we  come  to  analyze  and  trace  up  the 
ideas  that  thus  destroy  the  hope  of  a  future  life,  we 
shall  find  them,  I  think,  to  have  their  source,  not  in  any 
revelations  of  physical  science,  but  in  certain  teachings 
of  political  and  moral  science  which  have  deeply  per 
meated  thought  in  all  directions.  They  have  their  root 
in  the  doctrines  that  there  is  a  tendency  to  the  produc 
tion  of  more  human  beings  than  can  be  provided  for ; 
that  vice  and  misery  are  the  result  of  natural  laws;  and 
the  means  by  which  advance  goes  on;  and  that  human 
progress  is  by  a  slow  race  development.  These  doc 
trines,  which  have  been  generally  accepted  as  approved 
truth,  do  what  the  extensions  of  physical  science  do 
not  do — they  reduce  .the  individual  to  insignificance; 
they  destroy  the  idea  that  there  can  be  in  the  ordering 
of  the  universe  any  regard  for  his  existence,  or  any 
recognition  of  what  we  call  moral  qualities.  It  is  diffi- 


RELIGION    AND    THE    FUTURE    LIFE.  137 

cult  to  reconcile  the  idea  of  human  immortality  with 
the  idea  that  nature  wastes  men  by  constantly  bringing 
them  into  being  where  there  is  no  room  for  them. 
It  is  impossible  to  reconcile  the  idea  of  an  intelligent 
and  beneficent  Creator  with  the  belief  that  the 
wretchedness  and  degradation,  which  are  the  lot  of 
such  a  large  proportion  of  human  kind,  result  from 
his  enactments;  while  the  idea  that  man,  mentally  and 
physically,  is  the  result  of  slow  modifications  perpetu 
ated  by  heredity,  irresistibly  suggests  the  idea  that  it 
is  the  race  life,  not  the  individual  life,  which  is  the  object 
of  human  existence.  Thus  has  vanished,  with  many 
of  us,  and  is  still  vanishing  with  more  of  us,  that  belief 
which  in  the  battles  and  ills  of  life,  affords  the  strongest 
support  and  deepest  consolation. 

Population  does  not  tend  to  outrun  subsistence;  the 
waste  of  human  powers  and  the  prodigality  of  human 
suffering  do  not  spring  from  natural  laws,  but  from  the 
ignorance  and  selfishness  of  men  in  refusing  to  conform 
to  natural  laws.  Human  progress  is  not  by  altering 
the  nature  of  men,  but,  on  the  contrary,  the  nature  of 
men  seems,  generally  speaking,  always  the  same. 

—Henry  George. 

132.  THE  IDEA  OF  DEVELOPMENT  involves  the  idea 
of  maturity,  and  this,  that  of  decay;  in  other  words,  it 
involves  the  idea  of  cyclical  movement;  there  is  no 
such  thing  as  stability  in  things  material.  The  uni 
verse  itself  is  passing  through  its  cycle  of  changes 
which  must  finally  close;  the  universe  itself  is  en 
wrapped  within  the  complex  coils  of  a  law  which  must 
eventually  strangle  it  to  death. 


138  CALIFORNIA    ANTHOLOGY. 

Thus  the  cycle  of  the  individual  closes  in  death,  but 
the  race  progresses;  the  cycle  of  the  race  closes  in 
death,  but  the  earth  abides;  the  cycle  of  the  earth 
closes,  but  the  universe  remains;  finally  the  cycle  of 
the  universe  itself  must  close.  The  law  is  absolutely 
universal  among  things  material.  Where,  then,  shall 
we  look  for  true,  rectilinear,  ever-onward  progress? 
Where,  but  in  that  world  where  the  soaring  spirit  of 
man  is  freed  from  the  trammels  of  material  laws — the 
world  of  immortal  spirits. — Prof.  Jos.  LeConte. 

133.- 

In  thought,  in  feeling,  and  in  love, 
Things  do  not  perish,  though  they  pass; 
The  form  is  shattered  to  the  eye, 
But  only  broken  is  the  glass. 

Sun,  friend,  and  flower  have  each  become 
A  part  of  my  immortal  part; 
They  are  not  lost,  but  evermore 
Shine,  live  and  bloom  within  my  heart. 

-W.  A.  Kendall. 

134.  INFINITY. — Physical  causes  have  entirely  con 
cealed  three-sevenths  of  the  moon  from  our  observa 
tion.  And  this  must  always  remain  so  under  existing 
cosmical  arrangements.  No  conceivable  progress  in 
astronomy — no  possible  improvement  in  the  telescope 
can  remove  or  abate  the  difficulty.  It  is  true  that  it  is 
very  seldom  that  we  find  the  limits  of  human  knowledge 
so  sharply  defined,  as  in  the  case  of  the  physical  aspect 


RELIGION    AND    THE    FUTURE    LIFE.  139 

of  our  planetary  companion.  Nevertheless,  nearly  simi 
lar  conditions  exist  in  the  intellectual  world,  where,  in 
the  domain  of  deep  research  into  the  mysteries  and  the 
primeval  creative  forces  of  Nature,  there  are  regions 
similarly  turned  away  from  us  and  apparently  forever 
unattainable.  So  likewise,  in  those  systems  of  double 
stars,  which  the  astronomer  finds  scattered  through  the 
awful  abysses  of  space;  how  remote  the  analogies  to 
our  system !  What  complex  reactions  must  exist  be 
tween  the  planets  engirdling  the  double  suns  and 
their  duplex  centres  of  power  and  energy !  But  their 
features  are  forever  hidden  from  man;  we  can  never 
hope  to  explore  those  sacred  mysteries.  It  seems  to 
me  that  no  one  need  regret  that  there  are  some  enclosed 
spots,  some  secluded  regions,  some  quietudes  in  creation, 
which  will  be  unexplored  and  unpenetrated  forever. 
These  are  the  regions  in  the  intellectual  world  into 
which  faintness,  weariness,  and  broken-heartedness  may 
sometimes  flee,  and  find  shelter  and  repose !  Sweet 
and  inviting  mysteries — encouraging  mysteries — among 
whose  gentle  shadows  all  our  holy  aspirations,  our 
unnamed  yearnings,  humbly  and  tremblingly  advance, 
and  find  or  fashion  for  themselves  images  of  purity  and 
love — convictions  of  immortality — vistas  of  a  life  to 
come ! — Prof.  Jos.  LeConte. 

135.  ONE  ALL-PERVADING  PRINCIPLE. — The  Ionic 
philosophers  saw  only  one  all-pervading  principle  in 
nature,  though  personified  in  the  minds  of  some  by  one 
element  and  in  the  minds  of  others  by  another.  Thus, 
Thales  thought  it  water,  Anaxagoras  atoms,  Anaximenes 


140  CALIFORNIA   ANTHOLOGY. 

air,  Heraclitus  fire.  But  whatever  it  is,  science  and 
religion  see,  feel  it,  and  believe  in  the  same  thing, 
though  they  call  it  by  different  names  and  numberless 
sub-names.  We  feel  God  in  nature  and  in  ourselves 
as  the  blind  child,  feeling  with  its  fingers  the  lineaments 
of  the  face  it  loves,  reads  thus  the  secrets  of  the  heart 
behind  it. — Hubert  H.  Bancroft. 

136.  FAITH. — Happily,  for  all  things  beyond  the 
selfishness  of  the  day,  the  heart  is  stronger  than  the 
head.  No  nation  has  accomplished  a  high  destiny 
without  a  belief  in  something  better  and  higher  than 
itself.  Faith  is  the  parent  of  aspiration.  We  have 
a  high  destiny  before  us;  let  us  have  faith  in  it;  and 
faith  in  the  Higher  Power  which  beckons  us  towards 
its  accomplishment. 

Years  ago,  maternal  hands  led  us  to  the  modest 
church  which  gently  crowns  the  village  green;  or  by 
our  mother's  side  we  knelt  within  the  dim  aisles  of  the 
cathedral,  which  was  all  lighted  up,  for  us,  by  the  glory 
of  the  Madonna  and  the  smile  of  the  infant  Jesus. 
There  we  heard  those  sublime  words,  the  crown  of  the 
wisdom  of  Socrates  and  of  the  philosophy  of  Plato, 
towards  which  all  good  men  hacl  groped  before,  and 
which  all  good  men  have  followed  since:  "Do  unto 
others  as  ye  would  that  they  should  do  unto  you." 
We  have  been  taught  the  life-giving. principles,  which 
are  the  germ  of  the  religion  of  the  church  in  all  ages 
—of  the  religion  of  England,  of  the  religion  of  our 
fathers,  the  religion  of  good  deeds  and  noble  sacrifices; 
we  have  our  faith;  we  will  abide  by  it,  and  the  gates  of 
hell  shall  not  prevail  against  it. —  T.  W.  Frcelon. 


RELIGION    AND    THE    FUTURE    LIFE.  141 

137.  O,  AFFECTION,  FORGIVENESS,  FAITH  ! — Ye  are 
mighty  spirits,  ye  are  powerful  angels.  And  the  soul 
that  in  its  dying  moments  trusts  to  thee,  cannot  be  far 
from  the  gates  of  heaven,  whatever  the  past  life  may 
have  been.  However  passion  or  excitement  may  have 
led  it  astray,  if  at  the  last  and  final  hour  it  returns  to 
the  lessons  of  a  mother's  love,  of  a  lather's  care — if  it 
learns  the  great  lesson  of  forgiveness  to  its  enemies — 
if  at  the  last  moment  it  can  utter  these  words:  "Father 
of  light,  and  life,  and  love!"  these  shall  be  winged 
angels— troops  of  blessed  spirits — that  will  bear  the 
fainting,  wounded  soul  to  the  blessed  abodes,  and  for 
ever  guard  it  against  despair.  Oh,  my  friends  !  those 
mighty  gates,  built  by  the  Almighty  to  guard  the 
entrance  to  the  unseen  world,  will  not  open  at  the 
battle-axe  of  the  conquerer;  they  will  not  roll  back  if 
all  the  artillery  of  earth  were  to  thunder  forth  a  demand, 
which,  indeed,  would  be  lost  in  the  infinite  regions  of 
eternal  space !  but  they  will  open  with  thoughts  of 
affection,  with  forgiveness  of  injuries,  and  with  prayer. 

— Gen.  E.  D.   Baker. 


138.  ATHEISM. — The  clinching  argument  against 
atheism  is  not  that  there  is  such  constant  order  in  the 
universe,  but  that  so  many  facts,  apparently  independ 
ent  of  order,  play  so  beautifully  into  each  other  in  per 
fect  harmony.  Can  it  be  chance  that  determines  the 
mad  but  punctual  whirling  of  the  universe  ?  '  Think  of 
a  heap  of  letters  dropped  from  space,  sent  fluttering 


142  CALIFORNIA   ANTHOLOGY. 

through  the  air,  like  snow-flakes,  and  by  chance  arrang 
ing  themselves  into  the  scenes,  the  stirring  passages, 
the  solemn  climax  of  the  tragedy  of  Macbeth,  so  that 
all  the  characters  should  be  there !  The  proposition 
obliges  atheism  and  probability  to  look  each  other  in 
the  face.  If  Macbeth  is  probable  as  a  result  of  such  a 
shower  of  letters,  hurled  down  by  chance,  then  it  may 
be  confessed  that  chance  hurled  the  immense  physical 
alphabet  into  this  grand  poem  of  nature,  whose  leaves 
are  systems  and  each  word  a  world. — T/ws.  Starr  King. 


139.  RELIGION  NATIVE  TO  THE  HEART. — Religious 
sentiments  arc  native  to  the  heart  of  man.  They  dwell 
in  the  heart  of  the  savage,  they  illuminate  the  under 
standing  of  the  sage,  they  radiate  amid  the  haunts  of 
civilization  and  refinement.  Human  nature,  after  grop 
ing  for  a  season  in  the  darkness  of  its  fall,  began  to 
trace,  amid  the  aspirations  and  sublime  conceptions  of 
its  inner  thought,  the  glimmer  of  a  light  divine.  Un 
satisfied  longings,  restless  strivings  after  some  far-off 
good,  soon  taught  the  soul,  through  the  demonstrations 
of  its  inward  promptings,  that  its  essence  was  immortal. 
What  the  acute  investigations  of  reason,  aided  by  the 
deep  study  of  the  page  of  nature,  imparted  to  the  con 
templations  of  philosophy,  the  light  of  revelation  finally 
made  clear.  Socrates  beheld,  and  imparted  to  his 
acolytes,  the  sureties  of  an  immortal  life  and  the  in 
finite  being  of  a  God.  Cicero  had  bright  conceptions 
of  an  existence,  glorious  and  unending,  in  another 


RELIGION    AND    THE    FUTURE    LIFE.  143 

world.  These  minds,  and  multitudes  of  others,  soared 
beyond  the  vain  tenets  of  the  day,  which  frittered  away, 
in  a  multitude  of  deified  attributes,  all  just  ideas  of  a 
God,  and  their  piercing  flight  ceased  not  till  it  pene 
trated  to  the  lofty  realms  of  truth.  In  all  periods  of  the 
world's  history,  there  have  been  painful  spectacles  of 
free  opinion,  but  they  have  proved  exceptions  to  the 
spirit  of  the  age.  They  stand  as  stands  a  charred  and 
lightening-blasted  oak,  among  the  stalwart  giants  of  the 
forest.  Even  in  the  midst  of  the  dark  ages,  the  spirit 
of  religion  still  survived.  Wherever  Romanism  was 
rejected,  a  Theurgical  system  took  its  place,  which 
linked  the  mind  of  man  to  the  mysteries  of  a  world 
unseen,  and  his  spirit  to  the  worship  of  Divinity. 

— ^os.   W.  Winans. 

14O.  MAN'S  MISSION.— Franklin,  when  he  inter 
rogated  the  thunder-cloud,  and  received  in  response  a 
shock  from  the  key,  an  assurance  of  its  relationship  to 
electricity,  designed  not  to  change,  but  to  understand, 
the  laws  that  control  this  element  of  terror  that  had 
been  regarded  as  God's  avenging  messenger.  This 
knowledge  enabled  him  to  construct  lightning-rods  to 
protect  buildings  from  its  damaging  presence.  By 
studying  the  laws  of  this  ever  present  but  unseen 
agent,  Morse  was  enabled  to  subordinate  it  to  the 
noblest  purposes.  May  not  the  study  of  the  soul's 
origin,  its  capacity  and  destiny,  from  a  scientific  stand 
point,  reveal  to  us  knowledge  that  may  be  applied  for 
our  own  benefit  and  to  the  advancement  of  our  race  ? 
There  may  be  laws  too  occult  for  our  understanding, 


1  14  CALIFORNIA  ANTHOLOGY. 

but  there  are  none  so  sacred  as  to  forbid  our  desire  for 
their  comprehension.  This  immense  domain  for  human 
exploration,  for  the  present  and  for  the  eternal  future, 
demonstrates  the  grandeur  of  man's  character  and 
mission;  and  the  great  minds  which  occasionally  roll  up 
between  the  centuries  and  flash  their  liotit  like  meteors 

o 

in  the  sky,  are  ai)  earnest  of  man's  capacities,  and  the 
future  possibilities  of  all.  Copernicus,  Socrates,  Plato, 
Galileo,  Newton,  Locke,  Melancthon,  Edwards,  La 
Place,  Bowditch,  Leverrier  and  others,  are  historical 
monuments,  not  only  for  our  admiration,  but  our  imita 
tion.  It  is  a  glorious  as  well  as  a  consoling  thought, 
that  every  person  born  into  this  world,  is  in  the  posses- 
ion  of  the  germs  of  the  undeveloped  faculties,  which 
may,  at  some  period  in  the  vast  future,  transcend  in  its 
attainments,  these  great  lights  of  the  world ;  like  an 
inverted  pyramid,  spreading  outward  and  upward  in  its 
lofty  and  expansive  growth,  taking  hold  on  knowledge, 
that  carries  it,  as  it  were,  into  the  realms  of  the  infinite. 
What  man  has  accomplished,  it  may  be  possible  for  all 
men  to  acquire.  This  opens  to  us  the  beauty  and 
glory  of  that  life  and  future  into  which  we  all  are  soon 
to  enter,  when  to  know  and  to  love  shall  constitutue 
the  two  great  forces  that  are  to  move  us  onward  and 
upward,  into  the  empire  of  wisdom  and  the  realms  of 
eternal  bliss. — Gen.  John  A.  Collins. 

141.  THE  GOLDEN  AGE  TO  COME.  —  It  is  a 
glorious  three-fold  truth:  That  over  us  and  over  all 
things  there  exists  a  benignant  mind;  that  he  presides 
over  all  the  commotions  and  revolutions  of  history;  and 


RELIGION    AND    THE    FUTURE    LIFE.  145 

that  he  has  an  increasing  kingdom,  which  he  is  evolving 
out  of  the  very  evils  of  the  present,  as  a  lily  springs, 
white  and  beautiful,  out  of  the  quagmire.  Christianity 
invites  us  to  a  wide  survey.  1 1^  visions  and  vistas  are 
not  those  of  an  hour,  or  a  day  or  a  century,  but  rather 
those  of  immeasurable  ages.  God  is  in  no  hurry — He 
rests  not,  hastes  not.  He  employed  untold  ages  to 
complete  the  solid  earth  we  now  inhabit,  and  he  may 
employ  even  a  longer  period  to  carry  to  its  final  stages 
the  grander  process  of  the  moral  world.  The  mythol 
ogy  of  Greece  and  Rome  placed  the  Golden  Age  back 
in  the  distant  past.  Christianity,  on  the  other  hand, 
places  the  Golden  Age  forward  in  a  distant  future. 
Their  religion  was  a  bright  memory,  ours  a  glorious 
hope. — Rev.  W.  E.  I  jams. 

142.  THE  SCEPTIC — ANCIENT  AND  MODERN. — The 
ancient  skeptic  or  philosopher,  in  assailing  dogmas  and 
destroying  systems,  had  (at  least  in  his  best  judgment 
believed  he  had)  higher  ethics  and  purer  systems  to 
offer  in  their  place;  while  our  modern  sceptic,  in  his 
rage  for  novelty,  affectation  of  learning,  and  monstrous 
lust  of  destruction,  brutally  impugns  the  existing  order 
of  things — long  established  standards  of  right,  our 
present  system  of  religion  and  morality,  dismantling  it 
of  all  its  holy  traditions,  ridiculing  its  struggles,  dispa 
raging  its  triumphs,  and  consigning  to  puerility  the 
reverence  which  centuries  have  paid  it;  and  when  his 
devilish  work  is  done,  when  with  sacrilegious  wanton 
ness  he  has  scattered  our  sacred  treasures  to  the  four 
winds  of  heaven,  ignored  principles  which  mighty 


146  CALIFORNIA    ANTHOLOGY. 

minds  established,  and  destroyed  the  chart  by  which 
the  good  men  of  hundreds  of  generations  have  traveled 
on  happy  and  contented  in  their  journey  to  God, — I 
say,  when  all  this  work  of  destruction  is  complete; 
when  this  deadly  conspiracy  against  humanity  is  fully 
accomplished;  and  man's  reason,  in  its  hour  of  grievous 
unrest,  asks  the  sceptic  for  something  outside  of  self  and 
its  possibilities,  upon  which  it  can  depend  for  reference, 
guidance  and  instruction ;  when  man's  heart,  with 
plaintive  prayer,  asks  for  something  to  love,  something 
to  cling  to,  some  source  of  consolation  in  this  disap 
pointing  world,  some  hope  in  the  bitterness  of  death, 
the  sceptic's  hands  are  empty,  his  heart  is  cold,  his 
voice  is  silent;  having  robbed  us  of  our  birth-right,  in 
which  all  these  blessings  were  comprehended,  he  gives 
us  what  he  calls  a  "liberated  manhood,"  what  we  know 
to  be  an  incarnate  malediction,  an  existence  without  an 
object,  adversity  without  a  remedy,  a  grave  without  a 
hope,  a  death  which  means  annihilation. — Dr.  J. 
Campbell  Shorb. 


143.  TRUE  RELIGION  WELCOMES  TRUTH. —  The 
theory  that  the  Bible  is  an  infallible  record  has  wrought 
incalculable  disaster  both  to  science  and  religion,  and 
is  the  secret  of  the  alienation  between  them.  Why 
not,  then,  admit  that  a  man  may  be  inspired  as  to 
spiritual  truth,  and  yet  be  ignorant  as  to  scientific  truth  ? 
If  religious  people  would  only  be  reasonable,  there 
would  be  no  more  conflict  between  science  and  religion. 
What  is  religion  ?  Is  it  not  the  supreme  love  of  God, 


RELIGION    AND    THE    FUTURE    LIFE.  147 

and  the  unselfish  love  of  my  neighbor  ?  Religion, 
loaded  with  the  traditions  of  mythology,  the  errors  of 
Hebrew  poesy,  or  the  imperfections  growing  out  of  the 
human  element  of  inspiration,  will  terminate  in  the  de 
feat  of  faith  and  the  triumph  of  philosophy.  Man  is 
naturally  a  religious  being.  The  instinct  of  faith  in 
God  is  a  real  one.  Man  is  not  man  without  religion. 
Ministers  of  the  gospel  should  not  be  afraid  of  science. 
Chemistry  should  be  in  alliance  with  all  truth;  and  we 
should  be  ready  to  surrender  any  dogma,  however  dear, 
at  the  bidding  of  any  real  truth,  come  whence  it  may. 

—Rev.   W.  E.  Ijams. 

144.  THE  SPIRITUAL  FEELING. — Let  a  man  once 
realize  the  full  sense  of  the  truth  that  he  is  a  spirit,  and 
he  will  begin  to  act  like  an  immortal  child  of  an  Infinite 
Father.  Let  him  feel  that  this  earth  is  only  a  nursery 
of  souls,  that  here  he  learns  the  mere  alphabet  of  God's 
great  volume  of  everlasting  truth,  that  this  is  merely  a 
short  space  in  his  whole  career,  and  he  will  begin  to 
rise  out  of  the  filth,  how  deeply  soever  he  may  be  sunk 
in  it;  he  will  begin  to  stir  himself,  he  will  begin  to  lift 
his  head  up  among  the  stars,  he  will  begin  to  open  his 
bosom  to  the  inspiring  music  of  the  heavens,  and  to 
realize  his  affinity  with  all  that  is  beautiful,  glorious  and 
divine.  We  will  no  longer  build  our  religious  temples 
of  philosophy  out  of  the  old  debris  of  the  dead  centu 
ries;  we  will  build  them  out  of  the  blocks  of  solid  light 
which  science  has  quarried  out  of  the  eternal  deeps  of 
nature.  We  will  build  their  crystal  walls  of  the  pure, 
transparent  and  dazzling  beams  drawn  from  nature's 


148  CALIFORNIA    ANTHOLOGY. 

entire  compass.  They  shall  go  up  grandly,  until  the 
domes  shall  pierce  the  heavens,  and  all  mankind  wor 
ship  around  their  altars — sacred  to  the  rights,  liberties 
and  progress  of  all.  We  will  have  no  spiritual  hier 
archy,  but  inspired  men  and  women  shall  receive  their 
commissions  from  the  Genius  of  Nature;  and  we  will 
have  for  a  ritual  the  repetition  of  the  order  and  har 
mony  and  beauty  that  print  themselves  in  letters  of 
blazing  light  on  the  face  of  the  midnight  sky.  We  will 
have  for  members  all  humanity  that  carries  in  its  bosom 
faith  and  hope,  and  would  fain  get  rid,  some  day,  of  this 
encompassing  and  cramping  flesh  which,  when  we  are 
once  fairly  out  of  it,  will  enable  us  all  the  more  to  en 
joy  the  freedom  of  the  spiritual  republic  in  Heaven. 
All  the  truths  of  the  past  are  ours;  science  is  their 
handmaiden;  it  teaches  the  tender  sympathies  of  the 
soul  to  blossom  with  more  than  their  usual  freedom 
and  beauty;  it  has  a  smile  for  the  faithful,  encourage 
ment  for  the  disappointed,  inspiration  for  the  dull,  and 
hope  for  all  mankind. — Seldcn  J.  Finney. 


THE  CORRUPTING  INFLUENCE  OF 

REVIVALS. 

14B.  I.  REVIVAL  METHODS  ARE  RADICALLY  vicious. 
— The  speeches  and  prayers,  limited  to  three  minutes, 
and  stopped  by  a  tinkle  of  the  conductor's  bell;  the 
reading  of  piles  of  notes  for  the  conversion  of  indicated 
persons,  and  the  offering  of  supplication  for  them,  as 
though  prayer  were  a  method  of  sacred  sorcery;  the 
asking  of  young  persons  if  they  "know  the  Lord;"  the 


RELIGION    AND    THE    FUTURE    LIFE.  149 

solicitation  of  people  to  publish  their  most  sacred  feel 
ings  of  penitence,  or  their  equally  sacred  glooms  and 
distrusts  and  scepticism,  the  flitting  about  of  experts  in 
the  system  of  evangelical  pathology— if  one  can  contem 
plate  such  methods  of  dealing  with  the  religious 
nature,  in  a  season  of  excitement,  without  feeling  that 
permanent  harm  must  result  to  those  who  conduct  the 
system  and  those  who  are  the  victims  of  it,  he  must 
hold  a  conception  of  religion  and  religious  sensibilities 
that  needs,  I  think,  to  be  enlarged  and  refined.  Safety 
is  still  the  word  and  motive  that  is  executed  with  all 
possible  modulations  and  variations  in  the  whole  fan 
tasia  of  praying,  note-reading,  and  appeal.  "Come  to 
Christ;"  "get  an  interest  in  Christ;"  "fly  to  the  cross;" 
"find  the  Saviour;"  "delay  is  dangerous,  for  death 
may  overtake  you  to-morrow;" — these  are  the  char 
acteristic  calls  and  warnings  of  the  movement. 

This  shows  its  radical  vice.  Its  working-force,  so 
far  as  the  instruction  and  the  teachers  give  it  character, 
is  not  the  glory  of  truth,  the  beauty  of  holiness,  the 
need  of  human  nature,  for  its  health,  to  begin  to  serve 
God  and  be  educated  in  a  spiritual  estimate  of  all  nature 
and  all  life.  The  long  arm  of  its  lever  is  selfish  fear. 
Its  fulcrum  is  the  death-bed.  Its  aim  is  the  swinging 
of  men,  from  the  edge  of  the  grave,  over  the  abyss, 
into  a  mechanical  heaven. 

II.  REVIVALS  POISON  MANHOOD. — I  cannot  do  any 
thing  else  than  say  that  this  is  poison.  The  religious  emo 
tion  that  goes  to  the  meetings  may  be  pure  and  hope 
ful.  But  when  it  is  met  by  this  kind  of  instruction,  or 


150  CALIFORNIA    ANTHOLOGY. 

is  stimulated  thus  to  more  intense  vitality,  a  bane  is 
taken  into  the  spiritual  blood  that  I  believe  almost 
neutralizes  the  good  effect  of  a  renunciation  of  open 
sins.  Just  to  the  extent  that  this  doctrine  is  absorbed 
into  character,  the  manhood  is  injured.  The  person 
may  not  be  a  gross  offender,  as  before,  against  the 
commandments,  he  may  be  a  frequenter  of  prayer- 
meetings,  and  a  sincere  exhorter  to  flee  from  the  wrath 
to  come,  but  he  is  converted  to  be  stunted  ;  he  is 
innoculated  with  a  virus  that  chills  and  shrivels  his 
humanity;  he  is  turned  from  a  careless  and  perhaps 
generous-hearted  sinner,  into  a  miserable,  starveling 
dwarf  of  the  spiritual  order,  on  the  side  of  the  Lord. 

III.     REVIVALS  CORRUPT  YOUTH. — Not  lone:  agro   I 

o         o 

read  a  volume  containing  twenty-five  sermons,  recently 
preached  in  New  York  and  Brooklyn  with  reference  to 
the  revival,  by  the  most  distinguished  and  cultivated 
ministers  of  those  cities.  Some  of  the  most  powerful 
of  the  discourses,  I  read  in  my  library  till  past  mid 
night.  The  air  at  last  seemed  full  of  infernal  terrors 
and  woe,  and  I  shut  the  dreadful  book.  In  a  room  up 
stairs,  my  little  daughter,  six  years  old,  was  sleeping, 
with  whom  I  have  often  the  most  sweet  conversation 
upon  God  and  Christ,  and  the  life  hereafter. 

But  I  said  to  myself  then,  in  excitement  of  soul, 
what  I  will  say  here  with  seriousness  and  deliberation, 
that  rather  than  my  child  should  have  the  awful  the 
ology  of  the  average  of  that  book  stamped  upon  her 
heart,  I  should  unspeakably  prefer  that  she  should  grow 
up  an  atheist.  As  an  atheist,  the  best  currents  of 


RELIGION    AND    THE    FUTURE    LIFE.  151 

human  nature  would  not  be  corrupted  in  her.  Believ 
ing  what  that  book  teaches,  and  having  her  whole 
nature  cramped  and  distorted  into  its  mould,  it  would 
not  be  possible  that  her  spirit  could  have  any  religious 
beauty,  cheer,  or  peace. 

IV.     REVIVALS  DISHONOR  THE  DEITY. — A  large  num 
ber  of  men  and  women,  no  doubt,  do  reject  most  of 
this  venom.     They  are  sound  and  noble  in  spite  of  their 
theology.     Their  spiritual  sense  is  instinctively  so  deli 
cate  and  healthy,  that  this  leaven  of  Satan  in  the  bread 
of  life  offered  to  them,  is  quietly  cast  out  before  it  can 
pass  into  their  moral  blood.      But  the  majority  take  it 
into  their  constitution.      It  becomes  their  wisdom,  their 
motive,  their  measure   of  God's  character.     And  then 
what  can  they  know  of  the  Infinite   Perfectness  ?     Be 
lieving  that  God  has  appointed  a  terrible  and  irreversible 
final  doom,  that  yawns  just  beyond  the  sepulchre,  for 
every  man  that  has  misused   the  opportunities  of  this 
life;  that  he  will  never  pity  or  forgive  any  spirit  he  has 
made,  on  the  most  thorough  repentance,  through  eter 
nity — what  can  they  know,  under  such   instruction,  of 
that  perfectness  of  God  which  is  more  than  the  sum  of 
all  the  holy  and  lovely  qualities  of  human  character  on 
earth  ? 

Make  God  just  as  good  in  eternity  as  he  is  in  time. 
Put  religion  on  its  -natural  basis,  and  you  kill  the  revi 
vals,  you  shrivel  the  inquiry-meetings. 

V.     REVIVALS  REPEL  FROM  RELIGION  THE  YOUNG  LIFE 

AND  THE  BEST  INTELLECT  OF  THE    LAND. Let    any    man 

go  through  the  West,  and  talk  with  the  men  who  repre- 


152  CALIFORNIA    ANTHOLOGY. 

sent  the  energy  and  future  of  the  great  rising  States; 
let  him  hear  their  lamentations  over  the  dreariness  and 
huskiness  of  the  theology  that  is  poured  from  the 
pulpits,  their  confessions  of  the  inward  rebellion  and 
loathing  which,  when  they  go  to  church,  they  listen  to 
its  effete  traditions,  its  ghastly  philosophy  of  life,  its 
artificial  terrors,  its  theories  of  the  government  of  the 
moral  world,  so  discordant  with  the  simplicity  of  science, 
so  foreign  from  the  clearest  insight  which  our  best 
literature  reveals;  let  him  hear  them  utter  their  fears 
for  the  effect  on  society,  after  two  generations  more  of 
this  dismal  parody  of  a  gospel,  and  ask  if  some  nobler 
administration  of  truth  cannot  be  inaugurated  soon  and 
widely. 

The  awakening  in  this  country  by  which  hopes  will 
be  re-animated,  and  fresh  light  poured  into  the  popular 
he:irt,  will  flow  from  the  silent  stealing  of  new  truth 
into  our  theology.  We  want  such  an  access  of  truth 
that  the  general  mind  can  be  fed  with  a  worthier  con 
ception  of  God,  that  will  make  every  thought  of  him 
inspiring  as  the  dawn  of  the  morning,  and  will  banish 
the  superstition  that  this  life  is  the  final  state  of  proba 
tion,  as  an  insult  to  his  plan  of  eternal  education,  and 
a  chimera  of  a  barbarous  age. —  Thomas  Starr  King. 


THIS   LIFE   THE  AVENUE  TO  ANOTHER. 

146.  Political  Economy  has  been  called  the  dismal 
science,  and,  as  currently  taught,  is  hopeless  and  de 
spairing.  But  this  is  solely  because  she  has  been 
shackled  and  degraded;  her  truths  dislocated;  her 


RELIGION    AND    THE    FUTURE    LIFE.  153 

harmonies  ignored;  the  words  she  would  utter  gagged 
in  her  mouth,  and  her  protest  against  wrong  turned  into 
an  endorsement  of  injustice.  Freed  in  her  own  proper 
symmetry,  Political  Economy  is  radiant  with  hope. 
Properly  understood,  the  laws  which  govern  the  pro 
duction  and  distribution  of  wealth  show  that  the  want 
and  injustice  of  the  present  social  state  are  not  neces 
sary;  but  that,  on  the  contrary,  a  social  state  is  possible 
in  which  poverty  would  be  unknown,  and  all  the  better 
qualities  and  higher  powers  of  human  nature  would 
have  opportunity  for  full  development.  Further  than 
this,  when  we  see  that  social  development  is  governed 
neither  Ipy  a  Special  Providence  nor  by  a  merciless  fate, 
but  by  law,  at  once  unchangeable  and  beneficent;  when 
we  see  that  human  will  is  the  great  factor,  and  that, 
taking  men  in  the  aggregate,  their  condition  is  as  they 
make  it;  when  we  see  that  economic  law  and  moral 
law  are  essentially  one,  and  that  the  truth  which  the 
intellect  grasps  after  toilsome  effort,  is  but  that  which 
the  moral  sense  reaches  by  a  quick  intuition,  a  flood  of 
light  breaks  in  upon  the  problem  of  individual  life. 
These  countless  millions  like  ourselves,  who,  on  this 
earth  of  ours  have  passed  and  still  are  passing,  with 
their  joys  and  sorrows,  their  toil  and  their  striving, 
their  aspirations  and  their  fears,  their  strong  percep 
tions  of  things  deeper  than  sense,  their  common  feelings 
which  form  the  basis  even  of  the  most  divergent  creeds 
— their  little  lives  do  not  seem  so  much  like  meaning 
less  waste. 

The  great  fact  which   Science   in  all  her  branches 
shows  is  the  universality  of  law.      Wherever  he  can 


154  CALIFORNIA   ANTHOOLGY. 

trace  it,  whether  in  the  fall  of  an  apple  or  in  the  revo 
lution  of  binary  suns,  the  astronomer  sees  the  working 
of  the  same  law,  which  operates  in  the  minutest  divi 
sions  in  which  we  may  distinguish  space,  as  it  does  in 
the  immeasurable  distances  with  which  his  science  deals. 
Out  of  that  which  lies  beyond  his  telescope  comes  a 
moving  body,  and  again  it  disappears.  So  far  as  he 
can  trace  its  course  the  law  is  ignored.  Does  he  say 
that  this  is  an  exception  ?  On  the  contrary,  he  says 
that  this*  is  merely  a  part  of  its  orbit  that  he  has  seen; 
that  beyond  the  reach  of  his  telescope  the  law  holds 
good.  He  makes  his  calculations,  and  after  centuries 
they  are  proved. 

Now,  if  we  trace  out  the  laws  which  govern  human 
life  in  society,  we  find  that  in  the  largest  as  in  the 
smallest  community  they  are  the  same.  We  find  that 
what  seem  at  first  sight  like  divergences  and  exceptions, 
are  but  manifestations  of  the  same  principles.  And 
we  find  that  everywhere  we  can  trace  it,  the  social  law 
runs  into  and  conforms  with  the  moral  law;  that  in  the 
life  of  a  community,  justice  infallibly  brings  its  reward, 
and  injustice  its  punishment.  But  this  we  cannot  see 
in  individual  life.  If  we  look  merely  at  individual  life, 
we  cannot  see  that  the  laws  of  the  universe  have  the 
slightest  relation  to  good  or  bad,  to  right  or  wrong,  to 
just  or  unjust.  Shall  we  then  say  that  the  law  which  is 
manifest  in  social  life  is  not  true  of  individual  life  ?  It 
is  not  scientific  to  say  so.  We  would  not  say  so  in 
reference  to  anything  else.  Shall  we  not  rather  say 
this  simply  proves  that  we  do  not  see  the  whole  of 
individual  life  ? 


RELIGION    AND    THE    FUTURE    LIFE.  155 

The  laws  which  Political  Economy  discovers,  like 
the  facts  and  relations  of  physical  nature,  harmonize 
with  what  seems  to  be  the  law  of  mental  development 
—not  a  necessary  and  involuntary  progress,  but  a  pro 
gress  in  which  the  human  will  is  an  initiatory  force. 
But  in  life,  as  we  are  cognizant  of  it,  mental  develop 
ment  can  go  but  a  little  ways.  The  mind  hardly  begins 
to  awake  ere  the  bodily  powers  decline — it  but  becomes 
dimly  conscious  of  the  vast  fields  before  it,  but  begins 
to  learn  and  to  use  its  strength — to  recognize  relations 
and  extend  its  sympathies — when,  with  the  death  of 
the  body,  it  passes  away.  Unless  there  is  something 
more,  there  seems  here  a  break,  a  failure.  Whether 
it  be  a  Humboldt  or  a  Herschel,  a  Moses  who  looks 
from  Pisgah,  a  Joshua  who  leads  the  host,  or  one  of 
those  sweet  and  patient  souls  who  in  narrow  circles  live 
radiant  lives,  there  seems,  if  mind  and  character  here 
developed  can  go  no  further,  a  purposelessness  incon 
sistent  with  what  we  can  see  of  the  linked  sequence  of 
the  universe. 

By  a  fundamental  law  of  our  minds — the  law,  in  fact, 
upon  which  Political  Economy  relies  in  all  her  deduc 
tions — we  cannot  conceive  of  a  means  without  an  end, 
a  contrivance  without  an  object.  Now,  to  all  nature, 
so  far  as  we  come  in  contact  with  it  in  this  world,  the 
support  and  employment  of  the  intelligence  that  is  in 
man. furnishes  such  an  end  and  object.  But  unless  man 
himself  may  rise  to  or  bring  forth  something  higher, 
his  existence  is  unintelligible.  So  strong  is  this  meta 
physical  necessity,  that  those  who  deny  to  the  individ 
ual  anything  more  than  this  life,  are  compelled  to  trans- 


156  CALIFORNIA    ANTHOLOGY. 

fer  the  idea  of  perfectibility  to  the  race.  But  there  is 
nothing  whatever  to  show  any  essential  race  improve 
ment.  Human  progress  is  not  the  improvement  of 
human  nature.  The  advances  in  which  civilization 
consists  are  not  secured  in  the  constitution  of  man,  but 
in  the  constitution  of  society.  They  are  thus  not  fixed 
and  permanent,  but  may  at  any  time  be  lost,  nay,  are 
constantly  tending  to  be  lost.  And  further  than  this, 
if  human  life  does  not  continue  beyond  what  we  see  of 
it  here,  then  we  are  confronted,  with  regard  to  the  race, 
with  the  same  difficulty  as  with  the  individual.  For  it 
is  as  certain  that  the  race  must  die  as  it  is  that  the  in 
dividual  must  die.  We  know  that  there  have  been 
geologic  conditions  under  which  human  life  was  im 
possible  on  this  earth.  We  know  that  they  must  re 
turn  again.  Even  now,  as  the  earth  circles  on  her  ap 
pointed  orbit,  the  northern  ice-cap  slowly  thickens,  and 
the  time  gradually  approaches  when  glaciers  will  flow 
again,  and  austral  seas,  sweeping  northward,  bury  the 
seats  of  present  civilization  under  ocean  wastes,  as,  it 
may  be,  they  now  bury  what  was  once  as  high  a  civili 
zation  as  our  own.  And  beyond  these  periods,  science 
discerns  a  dead  earth,  an  exhausted  sun— a  time  when, 
clashing  together,  the  solar  system  shall  resolve  itself 
into  a  gaseous  form,  again  to  begin  immeasurable  mu 
tations. 

What,  then,  is  the  meaning  of  life — of  life"  absolutely 
and  inevitably  bounded  by  death  ?  To  me  it  only  seems 
intelligible  as  the  avenue  and  vestibule  to  another  life. 

— Henry  George. 


THE  FARM  AND  GARDEN. 


PART     V. 

THE  FARM  AND  GARDEN, 


147.  THE  INTELLECT  must  be  plowed  deeper  than 
the  furrows  of  the  field,  or  the  farmer  is  a  mere  serf  of 
the    soil — a   superior  kind    of    dray-horse — a  kind  of 
clown,  but  without  his  suppleness  of  wit  or  limb. 

— Samuel  B.  Bell. 

148.  THE  FARMER  THAT  PAYS  HIS   DEBTS  can't  get 

o 

rich  dishonestly,  in  the  sight  of  heaven.  There  can't 
be  too  much  wheat,  too  many  noble  cattle,  too  much 
wool,  an  excess  of  excellent  peaches  and  pears,  too 
many  pumpkins,  or  even  too  great  a  crowd  of  cabbages, 
if  they  are  not  eaten  so  immoderately  as  to  come  to  a 
head  again  on  human  shoulders. — Thos.  Starr  King. 

149.  THE  FIRST  MAN,   being  historically  and  tra 
ditionally  perfect,  had  a  garden  as  his  noblest  allotment 
The  farther  the  race  drifts  away  from  the  cultivation  of 
the  soil,  the  nearer  it  gets  to  barbarism.     The  Apache 
is  not  a  good  horticulturalist,  and  therefore  there  is  no 
gentleness  in  his  blood.      Teach  him  to  love  and  culti 
vate  a  garden,  and  he  is  no  longer  a  savage.     The  best 
thought  and  the  best  inspiration  may  come  to  one  when 
all  the  gentle  ministries  of  his  garden  wait  upon  him; 


158  CALIFORNIA    ANTHOLOGY. 

when  the  soul  of  things  is  concurrent  with  his  own;  and 
bee  and  almond-blossom,  the  rose,  and  the  smallest 
song-sparrow  in  the  tree-top,  are  revelators  and  in 
structors. —  W.  C.  Bartlctt. 

150.  ECONOMY   IN    AGRICULTURE. — The    Creator, 
who  gave  the  globe  to  Adam,  with  the  command  to  dress 
and  keep  it,  has  connected  economy  with  its  fertility. 
Economy  lies  at  the  base  of  high  and  permanent  civili 
zation.     Where  a  river  rises  every  year,  overflows  its 
banks,  and  renews  the  elements  which  the  land  has  ex 
pended  into  crops,  men  are  absolved  from  the  duty  and 
need  of  caring  for  the  soil.     God  takes  the  capital  unto 
his  own  keeping,  and  notifies  man  that  he  will  prevent 
its  waste.      But  where  this  is  not  done,  men  arc  notified 
just  as  plainly  that  they  must  repair  the  capital  and  pre 
serve  it  at  a  point  where  the  returns  will   be  generous 
and  perpetual.      The  interests   of  the  human   race  re 
pose   on  agriciilture,   and   agriculture  reposes   on   this 
law.     To  fulfill  it,  requires  immense  knowledge,  and  a 
reverent  and  persistent  thrift.     The  farmer  that  under 
stands  it,  and  acts  upon  it,  stands  at  the   head   of  all 
workers  on  the  planet. — T/ios.  Starr  King. 

151.  AGRICULTURE  STIMULATES   PATRIOTISM. — As 
the  roots  of  a  tree  derive  their  nourishment,   so  the 
foundations  of  society  derive  their  strength  from  the 
culture  of  the  soil.      It  was  her  devotion  to  agricultural 
pursuits  that  rendered  Poland  so  glorious  in  her  strug 
gle  against  tyranny — so  deeply  imbued  with  the  spirit 
of  freedom  that  the  whole  civilized  world  grew  sympa- 


THE    FARM    AND    GARDEN.  159 

thetic  in  her  cause,  until  the  very  name  of  Pole,  whether 
applied  to  those  who  chafed  at  home  under  the  thrall 
of  despotism,  or  those  who  were  sorrowing  abroad  in 
exile,  became  a  symbol  of  the  love  of  country.  The 
spread  of  farms  is  fatal  to  the  growth  of  penitentiaries. 

-Joseph    W.    Winans. 

152.  CONDITIONS  OF  SUCCESSFUL  FARMING. — Agri 
culture  can  be  successful   only  where  the  people   are 
moral ;  where  they  try  diligently  to  learn  the  conditions 
of  success  in  treating  the  land,  and  will  receive  it  as  a 
trust;  and  where,  too,  the  State  is  so  well  and  justly 
organized  that  near  markets  are  afforded,  so  that  the 
soil  can  receive  back  the  aliments  received  from  it  and 
essential  to  its  fertility.     As  yet  in  history  the  king 
doms  have  been  very  few  that  could  take  care  of  and 
develop  their  richest  soils.      They  have  known  enough 
to  be  warriors  and  conquerors,  to  create  literature,   to 
gem  magnificent  temples  and  museums  with  trophies  of 
art;  but  they  have  not  known  enough  to  be  successful 
farmers,  to  insure  the  fir  tree   for  the  thorn  and  the 
myrtle  tree  for  the  brier,  to  bring  out  and  keep  out  the 
beauty  on  the  land  which   Providence  designed,  and  to 
base    a    permanent    civilization    on    fields    thoroughly 
plowed  and  refreshed,  and  on  meadows  and   morasses 
dried,  diked,  and  guarded  by  watchful  energy  and  thrift. 

—  Thomas  Starr  King. 

153.  THE  TRUE   NOBLEMAN. — The  farmer  is  the 
true  nobleman  of  nature.      He  enjoys   a  rank  superior 
to  that  of  the  patricians  of  all  other  orders.     The  chief 


1GO  CALIFORNIA    ANTHOLOGY. 

nobles  of  every  country  in  Europe  derive  their  titles 
from  their  estates;  as  if  the  battle-fields,  reeking  with 
their  red  glories,  could  afford  no  appellation  so  endear 
ing  and  honorable  as  the  little  farm  upon  which  a  hero 
was  born.  His  avocation  renders  him  tolerant  and  kind, 
industrious  and  hospitable,  independent  and  free.  In 
peace,  he  is  amicable,  in  war,  invincible.  Every  blow 
that  he  strikes,  either  with  his  sword  or  his  hoe,  is 
'  struck  for  mankind.  The  farm-house  is  the  true  Temple 
of  Liberty,  the  Shrine  of  Virtue,  the  Altar  of  Patriot 
ism. —  William  H.  Rhodes. 

154.  THE  FARMER  FACE  TO  FACE  WITH  GOD.— 
Abandoned,  indeed,  must  be  the  heart  of  that  man 
whose  tongue  could  blaspheme  or  refuse  to  honor  the 
name  of  the  Most  High,  while  the  very  birds  are  thril 
ling  the  air  with  the  notes  of  His  praise.  Every  occu 
pation  of  the  fanner  brings  him,  as  it  were,  face  to  face 
with  his  Maker,  and  teaches  him  lessons  of  truth,  justice 
and  piety.  When  he  plows  his  ground  and  sows  his 
seed,  he  relies  not  upon  the  slippery  promises  of  men, 
but  upon  God  himself,  to  supply  the  moisture  and  to 
so  temper  the  atmosphere  as  to  sprout  the  seed  and 
mature  the  crop.  Every  flower  that  blooms,  every 
blade  of  grass  that  grows,  and  every  insect  that  crawls, 
tell  him  of  the  wisdom,  power,  goodness,  justice,  and 
mercy  of  the  Almighty.  When  he  plucks  from  the 
tree  the  rich,  ripe  fruit,  as  it  hangs  in  tempting  clusters 
around  the  parent  stem,  how  sublime  the  thought  that 
he  receives  this  luscious  food  direct  from  God,  no  mor 
tal  hand  intruding  between  the  giver  and  the  receiver 


THE    FARM    AND    GARDEN.  1G1 

to  break  the  charm  which  Divinity  throws  around  the 
precious  gift.  Accustomed  as  he  is  to  rely  upon  God 
and  his  own  strong  arm  for  what  he  eats,  drinks  and 
wears,  he  dares  to  think  what  is  right,  and  to  speak 
and  act  as  he  thinks. — Zachary  Montgomery. 

155.  THE  FARMER  THE  UNIVERSAL  MASTER. — We 
could  strike  from  society  the  merchant,  lawyer,  doctor, 
manufacturer  and  mechanic,  and  still  the  human  family 
could  be  sustained  in  the  enjoyment  of  life;  still  the 
great  work  of  moral  and  mental  improvement  could  go 
on.  But  strike  from  society  the  farmer's  calling,  para 
lyze  the  farmer's  hand,  and  society  would  not  alone  be 
shaken  to  its  base,  but  its  very  foundations  would  be 
swept  away  so  utterly  as  to  leave  not  a  wreck  behind. 
Let  the  seasons  but  for  one  year  cease  to  yield  their 
fertilizing  influence,  the  husbandman's  labors  throughout 
the  world  fail  for  one  year,  and  wherever  civilized 
man  exists  would  be  exhibited  a  scene  of  desolation 
and  woe,  such  as  was  felt  in  Egypt  when  the  angel  of 
death  went  forth  and  struck  down  the  eldest-born  in 
every  household.  The  worst  scenes  of  the  French 
Revolution,  the  hour  of  its  deepest  and  darkest  orgies, 
would  everywhere  appear ;  death  would  be  on  every 
hand ;  suffering  at  every  door.  Every  father  would 
mourn  the  death  of  his  first-born ;  every  mother  would 
be  a  Rachel,  weeping  for  her  children,  because  they 
were  not.  *  ""  Three-quarters  of  all  the  people  in 

the  United  States  are  engaged  in  farming.  The  farmer 
alone  is  independent;  he  alone  is  master  of  the  labor 

and  the  talents  of  every  other  class.      His  avocation  is 
11 


162  CALIFORNIA    ANTHOLOGY. 

the  highest  of  all  arts.  Has  the  plodding  plowman 
ever  thought  of  that  ?  It  is  not  only  a  higher  pursuit, 
being  independent  of  all  others,  but  it  is  the  highest  of 
all  arts.  It  is  even  given  to  the  farmer  and  gardener 
to  do  that  which  in  poetical  conception,  was  considered 
impossible — "to  paint  the  lily  and  add  fresh  perfume  to 
the  violet." 

It  is  most  singular  that  this  pursuit,  that  employs  the 
greatest  part  of  our  population,  the  most  important  in 
its  interests,  upon  which  all  other  pursuits  depend  and 
on  which  society  itself  exists,  has  never  been  fostered 
by  the  Government,  which  also  depends  upon  it  for  its 
own  maintenance.  No  statesman  has  taken  a  large 
view  of  the  agricultural  interest,  to  make  it  the  basis 
of  an  extensive  political  economy.  But  such  is  the 
fortunate  position  of  the  farming  interest  that  it  needs 
not  this  support.  It  is  one  of  its  greatest  triumphs, 
one  of  its  noblest  encomiums,  that  it  can  say:  "I  care 
not  for  the  protection  of  the  Government.  All  I  ask 
of  Government  is  to  let  me  alone;  let  me  take  care  of 
myself,  and  I  will  take  care  of  myself  and  you,  too." 

—Tod  Robinson. 

'166.  THE  FARM  THE  ABODE  OF  CONTENT. — The 
judicious  and  methodical  farmer  extracts  abundant 
leisure  for  domestic  duties  and  home  delights.  In  the 
good  progress  of  the  agricultural  art,  he  can  still  hover 
about  his  domestic  circle,  and  bend  upon  it  the  proper 
amount  of  regard  and  attention.  He  may  not,  by  some 
hazardous  speculation  in  trade,  realize  a  startling  in 
crease  to  his  hoards,  but  he  is  ever  certain  of  compe- 


THE    FARM    AND    GARDEN.  163 

tence,  and  can  surely  calculate  on  moderate  gain.  Bet 
ter  than  all  else,  he  enjoys  the  sweet  repose  of  heart 
and  mind.  He  clusters  about  him  his  intelligent  friends, 
and  quaffs  the  nectar  of  social  wisdom.  The  cares 
and  anxieties  and  acerbities  of  the  great  world  never 
reach  his  happy  home.  The  diseased  excitements  and 
prurient  amusements  of  the  great  city  have  no  charm 
for  him.  He  revolves  about  a  world  of  his  own.  He 
has  an  isolated  fireside  of  his  own,  virtuous  and  happy. 
Gradual  old  age  steals  upon  him;  but  it  finds  him 
cheerful  and  vigorous,  hemmed  in  on  all  sides  by  the 
ramparts  of  intelligence  and  affection.  So  I  wonder 
that  men  of  substance  linger  about  a  city  when  the 
country  beckons  them  to  affluent  bliss.  Old  Sam 
Johnson  applauded  a  city  life  to  the  day  of  his  death. 
But  Sam,  though  a  good  and  a  learned  ,man,  was 
wedded  to  his  club  and  his  porter  and  his  coterie  of 
adulators.  He  was  prejudiced  against  rusticity;  and  a 
prejudice  with  him  had  the  strength  that  lies  in  the  tail 
of  Leviathan.  He  loved  to  bully  and  swagger  over 
timid  city  gentlemen.  Old  Falstaff,  bloated  with  sack 
to  elephantine  rotundity,  bubbling  with  civic  wit,  and 
oozing  the  lard  of  metropolitan  repartee  as  a  wounded 
whale  its  blubber,  had  yet  a  green  cleft  amid  the  sterile 
crags  of  his  memory.  Disease,  as  winnowing  -wind, 
often  puffs  aside  the  chaff  of  lecherous  thought  and 
worldly  humors,  and  reveals  the  grain  of  earnest  and 
truthful  nature.  Dying  in  penury  and  disgrace,  his 
mind  flew  back  to  his  gambols  of  boyhood  upon  the 
green  sward.  He  babbled  of  green  fields.  The  crea- 


164  CALIFORNIA    ANTHOLOGY. 

tions  of  Shakespeare  are  humanity  in  its  truth  and  fer 
vor  and  condensation. — James  G.  Howard. 

157.  SANITARY  INFLUENCE  OF  TREES. — Rich,  moist, 
prolific  land,  with  decaying  vegetation,  in  a  climate  like 
that  of  portions  of  the  interior  of  California,  will  pro 
duce  miasma;  and  the  more  favorable  the  conditions 
for  vigorous  and  abundant  growth  and  consequent 
abundance  of  vegetation  to  decay,  the  larger  the 
amount  of  miasma  generated  or  given  off.  Such  lands 
will  always  be  sought  because  profitable  for  cultivation^ 
notwithstanding  the  penalty  attached  to  residing  upon 
them.  This  penalty  may  be  mitigated  or  perhaps 
avoided  by  a  knowledge  of  what  has  been  observed  ol 
the  laws  governing  this  cause  of  disease. 

While  miasma  is  given  off  by  decaying  vegetation,  it 
is  absorbed  or  arrested  by  growing  vegetation.  No 
other  fact  seems  to  be  so  universally  conceded  as  this. 
Primitive  forests,  when  left  to  the  undisturbed  opera 
tions  of  nature,  preserve  the  balance  between  growth 
and  decay,  and  do  not  largely  generate  miasma.  It 
does  not  prevail  in  the  bogs  of  Ireland,  nor  in  the 
Dismal  Swamp  of  Virginia  and  North  Carolina,  while 
their  surfaces  are  covered  by  perpetually  growing 
mosses  and  other  vegetation. 

When  forests  are  cut  down  and  the  balance  destroyed 
between  growth  and  decay,  the  means  provided  by- 
nature  for  the  absorption  of  miasma  are  removed,  and 
it  is  left  free  to  poison  the  air.  This  law  cannot  be 
better  illustrated  than  in  the  history  of  the  Campagna 
near  Rome.  At  the  commencement  of  the  Christian. 


THE    FARM    AND    GARDEN.  165 

era  it  was  covered  with  forests  of  trees  and  gardens. 
On  it  were  erected  the  magnificent  villas  of  the  Em 
perors  Domitian  and  Hadrian. 

The  effect  of  the  destruction  of  the  trees  in  changing 
this  paradise  to  a  pestilential  desert  is  observed  by 
every  traveler.  It  is  now  so  terribly  stricken  hy  mala 
ria  that  beyond  the  Church  of  St.  Paul,  about  two 
miles  from  the  walls  of  Rome,  I  could  not  see  a  human 
habitation  to  break  the  utter  solitude.  The  people 
who  cultivate  small  portions  of  it,  go  down  from  the 
hills  each  day,  long  after  the  sun  has  risen,  do  their 
work  in  the  heat  of  the  day,  and  escape  back  to  the 
hills  again  before  the  sun  has  set. 

It  will  be  seen  how  great  is  the  benefit  to  be  derived 
from  the  planting  of  forest  trees,  and  how  great  is  the 
crime  in  the  wanton  and  needless  destruction  of  the 
trees  on  the  borders  of  our  rivers,  sloughs  and  over 
flowed  lands,  and  the  certain  penalty  that  follows  this 
crime. — B.  B.  Redding. 

158.  THE  FARMER  A  CO-CREATOR  WITH  THE  IN 
FINITE. —  What  honor  the  highest  human  intelligence 
pays  to  a  painter  like  Landseer,  who  puts  a  superb 
mimic  sheep  on  canvas;  or  to  Troyon,  who  makes  a 
dreamy-eyed  beneficent  cow  look  at  us  from  his  colors ; 
or  to  Rosa  Bonheur,  who  startles  us  with  tableaux  of 
horses  clothed  with  thunder,  and  bulls  whose  look 
makes  the  room  unsafe !  This  is  right.  But  what  shall 
we  say  of  the  farmers  who  push  out  of  existence  the 
tribes  and  very  types  of  imperfect  or  degenerate  cattle, 
and  call  up  the  actual  horses  that  make  the  verses  of 


166  CALIFORNIA   ANTHOLOGY. 

Job  sing  in  the  brain,  and  sheep  fit  to  be  clad  in  the 
finest  merino,  and  herds  whose  very  attitude  is  a  new 
masterpiece  of  lordliness  or  beauty? 

In  looking  at  such  stock  I  can  easily  understand  the 
enthusiasm  which  leads  people  to  invest  thousands  and 
tens  of  thousands  in  the  experiments  of  model  farms. 
And  then  I  wonder  why  anybody  is  led  away  by  a  liter 
ary  or  artistic  ambition,  if  he  is  not  conscious  of  the 
first  class  of  powers.  Why  will  a  man  try  to  write 
imperfect  rhymes,  if  he  can  make  a  perfect  strawberry 
vine  or  moss  rose  ?  Why  put  a  blundering  idea  into  a 
book,  if  you  can  raise  a  litter  of  Suffolk  pigs,  and  thus 
see  a  divine  idea  multiplied  in  symmetrical  pork?  WThy 
waste  effort  with  pigments  on  canvas,  when  you  can 
put  an  Alderney  calf  on  a  landscape,  with  eye  more 
poetic  than  any  fawn  or  gazelle  ever  gazed  with — or  can 
ennoble  an  acre  with  an  actual  pair  of  young  Devons 
surveying  nature  in  their  dumb  dignity  ? 

These  gems  of  the  annual  shows  make  the  farmer's 
office  seem  noble,  a  co-creator  with  the  infinite.  They 
make  our  average  literature  and  art  seem  vapid,  and  in 
one  light  make  society  seem  sad;  for  where  are  the 
men  and  women  in  society  as  yet  that  are  as  noble  in 
their  spheres  as  these  animals — that  are  fit  to  own  them, 
that  come  within  a  distant  range  of  fulfilling  their  type 
in  the  Creator's  mind,  as  the  beasts  do  that  are  unstained 
with  sin  ? — Tlws.  Starr  King. 

159.  THE  BEAUTY  OF  RURAL  HOMES. — Whoever 
in  this  fair  State  of  ours,  has  become  owner  of  a  little 
nook  of  land  which,  by  patient  and  well  directed  toil, 


THE    FARM    AND    GARDEN.  167 

may  be  changed  into  a  garden,  must  feel  in  some  degree 
as  if  he  were  the  master  of  a  new  and  glorious  world. 
There  lie   the   fresh  and   smoking  furrows,  smiling  to 
think  of  the  countless  secrets  they  hide — the  fruit  and 
leaves  and  flowers,  the  shaded  walks  and  the   sloping 
lawns ;  there  the  new  maker  plans,  in  faith  and  patience, 
for  the  golden  years  of  a  long  and  useful  life.     The 
founding  of  a  home  is  one   of  the   purest  joys   left  to 
fallen  man ;    it  is  the  blessing  which  came  softly  out  of 
Paradise  with  Adam,  and  has   followed  his  wandering 
children  ever  since.      In  the  desire  for  rural  homes  the 
perennial  freshness  of  humanity  is  revealed.     As  every 
successive  generation  of  children  love  to  pull  corn-silk, 
and  tumble   in  the  hay-fields,  so   every  generation  of 
busy,  over-worked  men,  lawyers,  politicians,  merchants, 
editors,  love  to  unfasten  the  chafing  harness  at  times, 
and  choose  some  happy  spot,  by  the  rippling  streams, 
where    they  may  be  new  Adams,  received  again   into 
Paradise — new   dwellers    in    Arcadia.       Our    modern 
intense  life  draws  men  in  early  manhood  to  the  centers 
of  activity,  where   fortunes   and   reputations  are   to  be 
won ;    but  their  hearts,  as  they  grow  older,  turn  back  to 
the  grassy  fields,  the  blooming  gardens,  the  quiet  hearth, 
the  country  freedom;    and  they  remember  with  deeper 
affection  the  old  farm-house  of  their  boyhood,  the  fruit 
ful  orchards,  the  fragrant  garden. 

Men  have  a  curious  habit  of  stamping  their  person 
ality  on  the  clothes  they  wear,  the  team  they  drive,  the 
house  they  live  in,  and  all  their  property,  real  and  per 
sonal.  In  a  most  complete  sense  the  grounds  a  man 
lays  out,  takes  care  of,  and  enjoys,  become  like  himself; 


1G8  CALIFORNIA   ANTHOLOGY. 

or  rather,  in  a  very  precise  way,  give  us  glimpses    of 
his  nature  and  hints  of  his  possibilities.     Indeed,  I  love 
to  notice  the  constant  changes  and  little  improvements  in 
every  village  through  which  I  pass,  and  make  wonder 
ing  guesses  concerning  the   owners  of  each  successive 
cottage.     Altheas,  lilacs,  a  damask  rose,  groups  of  pan^ 
sies,  and  clambering  wealth  of  sweet  peas,  with  perhaps 
a  sugar  maple,  evidently  cherished — it  is  a  suggestion 
of  a  New  England  family.    An  Irish  yew-tree  by  the 
gate,  a  row  of  black  currants  along  the   fence,  Shrop 
shire  damsons  and  Kentish  cherries  in  the  orchard,  box 
borders  and  Covent  Garden  Stocks — this  is  staid,  portly 
old   England,   surely.       Bottle   gourds  over   the  well, 
balsams    and    crape     myrtle    by    the    door,    melons 
and    gumbo    in    the    vegetable    garden — here    is    a 
picture  from  the   sunny   South.      Dill,   saffron,    yellow 
marrigolds,   sun-flowers   and    horse-beans,    in    straight 
rows,  in  front  of  a  door  painted  red,  yellow  and  blue— 
this  can  only  be  a   Portuguese  family  from  the  Azores. 
It  is  the  charm  of  California,  in  the  eyes  of  her  children, 
that  so  many  variations  are    possible   here;    so  many 
widely  different  types  of  gardening  succeed  and  blend 
harmoniously  in  our  landscapes.     The  man  who  chooses 
his  nook  of  earth  and  founds  a  home  there,  is  justly  en 
titled  to  that  too-often  bestowed  title  of  "public  bene 
factor."     The  tired   travelers,    plodding  wearily  along 
the  dusty  summer  road,  look  gladly  on  the  waving  spires 
of  green,  the  soft,  bright  grass,  the   cool  fountains,  the 
(lashes   of  color  from  the   well   kept    beds,   the    bend 
ing  and  fruitful  boughs,  and  are  made  more  hopeful  by 
all  this  beauty  and  repose.      It  is  for  the  owner  a  daily 


THE    FARM    AND    GARDEN.  169 

blessing.  As  the  years  increase,  the  hallowed  memo 
ries  of  home  thickly  cluster.  The  voices  of  happy- 
children,  some  of  them  no  longer  on  earth,  and  thus 
eternally  young,  yet  seem  to  echo  beneath  the  arching 
trees,  which  his  own  hand  planted  long  before.  The 
blue-bells  and  the  violets,  the  fragrant  lilies  and  the 
passion-hearted  roses — these  carry  his  dreams  back  to 
his  boyhood,  and  move  his  soul  to  tears.  The  im 
pulse  is  justified  which  led  him  to  found  a  home. 

—Chas.  H.  S/iinn. 

16O.  THE  FARMER  THE  MONARCH  OF  MEN. — Who 
is  nurtured  with  such  an  education  as  the  farmer  ?  He 
is  nursed  in  the  strong  embrace  of  prolific,  many- 
handed  -Nature,  our  mother  who  keeps  the  wisest 
school,  and  who  is  the  voice  and  the  hand,  the  ferule 
and  the  prize  of  Deity.  I  almost  believe  that  no  man 
can  be  one  of  God's  great  men,  unless  nurtured  in  the 
embrace  of  our  great  mother — on  the  bosom  of  the 
earth.  All  men  should,  some  time  in  their  lives,  live 
out  in  the  midst  of  nature,  and  till  the  soil.  He  who 
has  been  born  and  reared  and  lives  in  a  city,  debarred 
from  the  privilege  of  communing  with  Nature,  is  most 
unfortunate.  He  can  never  be  a  whole  man.  He  lacks 
the  stern,  true,  poetic  teachings  of  the  Great  School. 
Nothing  can  compensate  for  it.  An  undevout  farmer 
is  a  monster.  Can  the  husbandman  receive  his  food 
direct  from  heaven — its  rains  and  dews  and  sunshine — 
its  smile  over  him  in  the  blue  and  peaceful  vault,  sun- 
and-moon-and-star-lit? — all  around  him  the  wavy  grass 
and  grain,  the  many  tinted  flowers,  the  voices  of  the 


170  CALIFORNIA   ANTHOLOGY. 

wind  and  bending  trees — underneath  him  the  prolific, 
fresh-turned  soil — and  still  be  a  monster,  out  of  tune 
with  Nature?  Who  lives  so  far  from  temptation,  so 
nigh  to  his  Creator,  enwrapt  all  round  about  with  his 
arms,  fed  from  his  dazzling,  munificent  hand,  sleeps 
between  the  leaves  of  God  pictured  book — the  Uni 
verse.  His  tyranny  is  over  barrenness.  He 
smites,  and  lo!  the  sterile  earth  groans — but  it  is  with 
abundance.  He  brings  his  enemies  to  the  faggot  and 
stake — but  they  are  the  thorn,  the  thistle  and  the  brier. 
He  overruns  and  subdues  the  territories  of  his  foes— 
but  they  are  the  swamp,  the  fen,  and  the  quagmire. 
He  plows  up  the  very  foundations  of  the  strongholds 
of  his  destroyers — but  they  are  the  deadly  malaria,  the 
stinging  insect,  and  the  fanged,  poisonous  reptile.  The 
Earth  is  his  slave,  but  it  is  the  slavery  of  love,  for  it 
buds  and  blossoms  before  him,  and  its  trees  clap  their 
hands  for  joy  of  him.  He  chains  his  servants  to  do 
his  will,  but  they  are  the  elements,  they  are  the  huge 
and  willing  ox,  the  majestic  horse,  impatient  to  do  his 
bidding,  and  champing  for  the  word  that  bids  him  go. 
When  he  stretches  his  scepter  abroad,  cities  spring  up 
under  its  shadow.  The  sounds  of  the  spindle,  the 
loom  and  the  anvil,  and  the  ponderous  foundry  and 
mill,  are  heard.  The  hum  of  industry  comes  like  the 
noise  of  many  waters  ;  white-winged  ships  fly  over 
the  unstable  main ;  men  cast  aside  their  hides  and  fig 
leaves,  and  put  on  imperial  garments ;  women  are 
arrayed  in  fabrics  fine  as  gossamer,  and  many  tinted  as 
the  sun-set  cloud.  Penury,  pestilence  and  famine  he 
keeps  bound  in  his  prison  house.  Labor  stands  in  the 


THE    FARM    AND    GARDEN.  171 

door  of  his  magazine,  and  in  his  stalwart  hands  he  holds 
scales  of  human  life,  and  weighs  out  the  supplies  of 
Trade  and  Art  and  Armies ;  of  School  and  Church  and 
State  ;  Food  and  Raiment ;  Abundance  and  Luxury. 
He  deals  out  the  Progress  of  Human  Kind!  He  is 
the  Monarch  of  Men ! — Saimtel  B.  Bell, 

161.  A  VAST  FIELD  OF  KNOWLEDGE. — Agriculture 
to  the  active  intellect  is  fruitful  in  subjects  of  thought 
and  contemplation,  and,  when  intelligently  pursued,  the 
whole  being  is  enriched  by  the  vast  field  of  knowledge 
it  unfolds.  It  is  an  occupation  that  elevates  the  mind 
to  a  genial  communion  with  surrounding  nature;  it  is 
closely  connected  with  the  material  wants  of  the  whole 
human  family ;  it  develops  and  beautifies  the  earth ;  it 
produces  a  healthy,  thrifty  and  virtuous  population; 
and,  more  than  any  other  pursuit  known  to  man,  adds 
to  the  pride,  prosperity  and  strength  of  a  State.  That 
it  is  intimately  connected  with  the  education  and  intelli 
gence  of  a  community,  is  clearly  proved  in  the  history 
of  our  country  as  well  as  the  history  of  the  world.  To 
man's  necessities,  comfort  and  happiness,  the  tillage 
and  yield  of  the  soil  are  of  the  first  consequence;  and 
an  intelligent  prosecution  of  his  work  requires  from  the 
agriculturist  a  familiarity  with  the  causes  and  effects  of 
his  labor,  and  a  knowledge  of  botany  and  chemistry, 
which  aids  him  in  the  development  of  his  resources, 
and  elevates  his  calling  to  the  dignity  of  a  science. 
The  classic  authors  and  orators  of  Greece  and  Rome 
delighted  to  write  and  speak  of  agriculture,  and  labored 
to  instil  a  love  for  it  into  the  mind.  In  those  ancient 


172  CALIFORNIA    ANTHOLOGY. 

times,  the  highest  citizens  and  most  prominent  states 
men — the  most  successful  warriors  and  the  most  con 
vincing  writers — were  cultivators  of  the  soil.  Even 
kings  and  princes  have  been  known  to  resign  their  power 
to  become  farmers,  while  farmers  have  been  called  from 
the  field  to  become  kings.  The  familiar  story  of  Cin- 
cinnatus,  who,  in  the  days  of  the  old  Roman  Republic, 
received  an  embassy  from  the  people  while  in  the  very 
act  of  plowing  in  the  field,  had  an  illustrious  prototype 
in  the  example  of  Elisha,  whose  mantle  of  a  prophet 
was  urged  upon  him  while  working  his  land  with  a  team 
of  twelve  yoke  of  oxen.  Among  the  great  of  modern 
times  who  have  devoted  themselves  to  farming,  was  he 
who  was  "  first  in  peace "  as  in  war.  Few  probably 
ever  possessed  so  keen  a  love  for  rural  pursuits,  and  a 
more  unyielding  pride  in  the  profession  of  a  farmer, 
than  George  Washington.  Always  an  early  riser,  he 
was  enabled  to  see  that  the  day's  work  was  properly 
begun,  and  careful  to  exact  the  utmost  accuracy  and  ; 
fidelity  from  those  he  employed.  Before  the  war  his  j 
name  was  known  in  London  as  the  most  reliable  plamer 
in  Virginia,  and  the  produce  of  his  plantations  would 
command  a  better  price  than  that  of  any  other  in  the 
colonies.  "I  think,"  he  said,  "the  life  of  a  husbandman 
of  all  others  is  the  most  delightful.  It  is  honorable,  it 
is  amusing,  and  with  judicious  management  it  is  profita 
ble."  If  it  be  true,  then,  that  the  dignity  of  a  calling 
depends  upon  the  character  of  those  who  pursue  it,  the 
status  of  the  agriculturist  has  been  fixed  and  ennobled 
from  the  remotest  ages  of  the  world  to  the  present  day. 

—Leland  Stanford. 


THE  FARM  AND  GARDEN.  173 

162.  THE  BASE  OF  THE  WHOLE  FABRIC  OF  LIFE. — 
As  we  stand  and  live  upon  our  great  mother  earth,  so 
the  whole  fabric  of  enlightened  life  stands  upon  agricul 
ture.  Not  alone  because  it  feeds  and  clothes  our  bodies, 
but  because  of  its  moral  and  philosophic  forces  as  well 
as  its  physical.  Egypt  was  the  first  cradle  of  agricul 
ture;  it  was,  therefore,  the  first  cradle  of  civilization. 
The  Israelites — the  chosen  people — were  no  excep 
tion  to  the  rule.  In  their  early  career,  they  did  not 
till  the  soil.  They  had  to  be  taken  down  into  Egypt 
to  learn  Agriculture,  or  they  would  have  been  barbarians. 
The  Greek  and  the  Roman  would  have  been  barbarians 
had  they  not  learned  agriculture.  Men  are  mere  tribes 
—hordes — without  agriculture.  It  is  the  mother  of 
stability,  with  infinite  progression.  It  is  the  mother  of 
wealth,  of  law  and  order,  of  manufactures,  commerce 
and  the  arts.  From  this  source  spring  the  great  emo 
tions  of  the  soul,  patriotism,  social  and  political  order, 
churches,  schools,  science  and  religion,  long  life,  strong 
life,  abundance.  Without  it  the  world  could  not  be 
populated.  Pioneering  tends  to  barbarism,  because  it 
tends  to  roving.  Pioneering  is  almost  buccaneering. 
We  are  pioneers  (A.  D.  1858)  and  yet  see  here  this 
early  and  devout  attention  to  agriculture.  We  are  the 
mildest  mannered  buccaneers  of  history.  What  had 
this  State  done  without  agriculture?  The  present 
generation  might  have  survived  in  some  sort  of  repute, 
from  the  force  of  early  education;  but  the  generation 
to  come  would  have  been  as  the  present  Arab  to  the 
ancient  Saracen,  the  present  Mexican  to  the  ancient 
Spanish  Cavalier.  Gold  is  not  wealth;  it  is  but  its  con- 


-174  CALIFORNIA   ANTHOLOGY. 

venient  representative.  Commerce  is  not  wealth;  it 
simply  exchanges  it.  Manufactures  and  art  are  not 
wealth;  they  recombine  it.  Agriculture  is  the  prolific 
mother  of  wealth.  The  rest  simply  handle  it  when  it 
is  produced  and  delivered  into  their  hand.  The  earth 
breeds  savages ;  agriculture  breeds  enlightened  nations. 
It  breeds  houses  and  ships,  temples  and  seminaries, 
manufactories,  sculpture,  painting  and  music.  It  would 
be  folly  to  speak  of  the  existence,  beauty  or  power  of 
any  of  these,  without  agriculture.  The  thermometer  of 
civilization  rises  or  falls  as  drives  or  pauses  the  plow. 

—Samuel  B.  Bell. 

163.  NATURE  ENFORCES  ECONOMY  TOWARD  THE 
SOIL. — Have  you  read  in  one  of  the  volumes  of  "Les 
Miserables,"  Victor  Hugo's  description  of  the  sewer  of 
Paris,  and  his  reflections  on  it  ?  He  tells  his  country 
men  that  all  that  filth  is  gold,  and  that  they  sweep  it 
into  the  abyss.  We  fit  out  convoys  of  ships,  at  great 
expense,  to  gather  up  at  the  south  pole  the  droppings 
of  petrels  and  penguins,  and  the  incalculable  element 
of  wealth  which  we  have  under  our  own  hand  we  send 
to  sea.  All  the  fertilizing  substance,  human  and  ani 
mal,  which  the  world  loses,  restored  to  the  land,  instead 
of  being  thrown  into  the  water,  would  suffice  to  nourish 
the  world.  These  heaps  of  garbage  at  the  corners  of 
the  stone  blocks,  these  tumbrels  of  mire  jolting  through 
the  streets  at  night,  these  horrid  scavengers'  carts, 
these  streams  of  subterranean  sKme,  which  the  pave 
ment  hides  from  you,  do  you  not  know  what  all  this  is? 
It  is  the  flowering  meadow;  it  is  the  green  grass,  it  is 


THE    FARM    AND    GARDEN.  175 

marjoram  and  thyme  and  sage;  it  is  game,  it  is  cattle, 
it  is  the  satisfied  low  of  huge  oxen  at  evening;  it  is 
perfumed  hay,  it  is  golden  corn,  it  is  bread  on  your 
table,  it  is  warm  blood  in  your  veins,  it  is  health,  it  is 
joy,  it  is  life.  Thus  wills  that  mysterious  creation  which 
is  transformation  upon  earth,  and  transformation  in 
heaven.  There  is  one  thing  in  which  the  half-civilized 
Mongolians  can  defy  their  civilized  foes  to  instruct 
them — the  great  art  of  keeping  the  soil  fertile  steadily 
for  centuries.  Japan  is  about  as  large  as  England  and 
Ireland  combined.  So  much  of  its  area  is  hilly  that 
hardly  more  than  half  is  fit  for  tillage.  Great  Britain 
imports  food  from  other  countries  to  the  extent  of  many 
millions  annually.  But  Japan  supports  a  larger  popu 
lation  than  England  and  Ireland.  She  exports  grain 
now  to  foreign  countries.  She  maintains  the  richness 
of  her  soil,  and  has  kept  it  at  a  high  and  even  rate 
of  productiveness  through  centuries  that  stretch  back 
beyond  the  decay  of  Greece,  beyond  the  birth  of  Rome, 
to  the  days  of  Solomon,  possibly  to  the  age  of  Moses. 
She  has  done  it  by  careful  obedience  to  the  laws  of 
restoration  which  God  has  written  in  the  soil.  She 
treats  the  soil  as  a  factory.  Wanting  cloth  from  it,  she 
gives  the  woof  out  of  which  the  cloth  is  woven.  She 
finds  that  Nature  will  toil  for  man  forever,  if  man  will 
give  her  the  elements  of  her  miracles.  She  reverently 
offers  to  the  wand  of  Providence  the  filth  of  cities,  that 
it  may  be  transmuted  into  flowers  and  bread.  Cali 
fornia  will  prove  no  exception  to  the  general  law  of 
nature  which  enforces  economy  towrard  the  soil.  The 
Creator  gives  our  land  to  us  as  a  trust,  and  if  we  do 


176  CALIFORNIA    ANTHOLOGY. 

not  try  to  pass  it  over  to  our  children  with  but  little 
reduction  of  its  vitality,  we  are  simply  squandering  our 
capital  in  our  great  harvests  now,  and  mortgaging  also 
the  patrimony  of  posterity. —  Thomas  Starr  King. 


THE   GARDENS  OF  THE  PETERSKOI. 

164.  I  spent  an  evening  at  the  Peterskoi,  which  I 
shall  long  remember  as  one  of  the  most  interesting  I 
ever  spent  at  any  place  of  popular  amusement.  The 
gardens  of  Peterskoi  are  a  favorite  place  of  resort  in 
summer,  near  Moscow — famous  for  its  chateau  built  by 
the  Empress  Elizabeth,  in  which  Napoleon  sought 
refuge  during  the  burning  of  Moscow.  The  weather 
was  charming;  neither  too  warm  nor  too  cool,  but  of 
that  peculiarly  soft  and  dreamy  temperature  which  pre 
disposes  one  for  the  enjoyment  of  music,  flowers,  the 
prattle  of  children,  the  fascinations  of  female  beauty, 
and  the  luxuries  of  idleness.  In  such  an  atmosphere 
no  man  of  sentiment  can  rack  his  brain  with  trouble 
some  problems  concerning  the  origin  of  the  human  race, 
or  abuse  his  limbs  rambling  through  dirty  streets  in 
search  of  curiosities,  or  do  any  other  labor  usually 
allotted  to  the  tourist.  Such  evenings,  and  such  nights, 
when  the  sun  lingers  dreamily  on  the  horizon,  when  the 
long  twilight  weaves  a  web  of  purple  and  gold  that  binds 
the  night  to  the  morning;  when  nature,  wearied  of  the 
dazzling  glare  of  day,  puts  on  her  delicate  silver-span 
gled  night  robes,  and  reclining  upon  her  couch,  smiles 
upon  her  loving  worshipers,  and  tells  them  to  "woo 


THE    FARM    AND    GARDEN.  177 

her  gently,  and  with  honeyed  words,"  when  stubborn 
hearts  are  softened  and  haughty  eyes  made  gentle  by 
the  invisible  spirits  that  hover  in  the  air — ah,  surely 
such  evenings  and  such  nights  were  never  made  for 
sleep.  The  veriest  monster  in  human  shape  cannot  be 
utterly  insensible  to  their  inspiring  influence.  We  must 
make  love,  sweet  ladies,  or  die. 

The  gardens  of  the  Peterskoi  are  still  a  dream  to 
me.  It  was  night  when  I  first  entered  their  portals. 
Guards,  in  imperial  livery,  glittering  from  head  to  foot 
with  richly-wrought  embroidery,  stood  at  the  gateway 
and  ushered  in  the  company  with  many  profound  and 
elegant  bows.  Policemen,  with  cocked  hats  and  glitter 
ing  epaulettes,  were  stationed  at  intervals  along  the 
leading  thoroughfares,  to  preserve  order.  The  scene 
within  was  singularly  rich,  glowing  and  fanciful.  In 
every  feature  it  presented  some  striking  combination 
of  natural  and  artificial  beauties,  admirably  calculated 
to  fascinate  the  imagination.  I  have  a  vague  recollec 
tion  of  shady  and  undulating  walks,  winding  sometimes 
over  sweeping  lawns,  dotted  with  wide-spreading  trees, 
copses  of  shrubbery  and  masses  of  flowers;  sometimes 
over  gentle  acclivities,  surmounted  by  rustic  cottages, 
or  points  of  rocks  overhung  with  moss  and  fern;  here 
branching  off  into  cool  umbrageous  recesses,  where 
caves,  with  glittering  stalactites,  invited  the  wayfarer 
to  linger  a  while  and  rest;  there  driving  suddenly  into 
deep  glens  and  retired  grottos,  where  lovers,  far  hidden 
from  the  busy  throng,  might  mingle  their  vows  with  the 
harmony  of  falling  waters. 

What  a  pity  we  should  ever  grow  old,  in  this  beauti- 


12 


178  CALIFORNIA    ANTHOLOGY. 

fill  world,  with  so  many  fair  ladies  in  it  to  be  wooed  and 
won !     Who  could  be  insensible  to  their  charms  on  such 
a  night  and  amid  such  scenes,  when   the   very  flowers 
are  whispering  love  to  each  other,  and  the  lights  and 
shadows  are  wrought  into  bridal  wreaths?     Here  one 
can  fancy  the   material  world  has  ceased.      Reality  is 
merged    into    the    realms    of    enchantment.       Marble 
statues,  representing  the  Graces,  winged  Mercuries  and 
Cupids,  with  their  bows  and  arrows,  are  so  cunningly 
displayed  in  relief  against  the  green  banks  of  foliage, 
that  they  seem   the  natural   inhabitants  of  the  place. 
Snow-spirits,  too,  with   outspread  wings,  hover  in  the 
air,  as  if  to  waft  cooling  zephyrs  through  the  soft,  sum 
mer  night.      Fountains  dash  their  sparkling  waters  high 
into  the  moonlight,  spreading  a  mystic  spray  over  the 
rich  green  sward.     Through  vistas  of  shrubbery  gleam 
the  bright  waters  of  a  lake,  overhung  by  cliffs  and  em 
battled  towers  and  the  drooping  foliage  of  trees.     On 
an  elevated  plateau  stand  Asiatic  temples  and  pagodas, 
in  which  the  chief  entertainments  are  held.     The  ap 
proaching  avenues  are   illuminated  with   brilliant  and 
many  colored  lights,  hung  from  the  branches  of  trees, 
and  wind  under  triumphal  arches  overhung  with  flowers. 
Theaters  present  open  fronts,  richly  and  curiously  dec 
orated.     Artificial  grottoes  and  fountains,  that  seem  to 
cast    forth    glittering   gems;     temples    and    embattled 
towers,  palaces  and  ruins — all  aglow  with  brilliant  and 
mysterious  lights,  are  scattered  in  sumptuous  profusion 
over  the  grounds.     The  open  spaces  in  front  of  the 
theaters  are  filled  with  the  rank  and  fashion  of  the  city, 
in  all  the   glory  of  jeweled  head  dresses,  brilliant  cos- 


THE    FARM    AND    GARDEN.  179 

tumes,  and  decorations  of  Orders.  Festoons  of  va 
riegated  lights  swing  from  the  trees  over  the  audience. 
Painted  figures  of  dragons  and  genii  guard  every  ave 
nue.  Rustic  seats  and  elegant  divans  are  scattered  in 
the  most  inviting  nooks,  and  tables,  overshadowed  by 
hanging  rocks,  spangled  with  stalactites  of  silver,  indi 
cate  where  rest  and  refreshment  lend  their  aid  to  the 
varied  pleasures  of  the  eye.  The  gorgeous  profusion 
of  lights  and  glittering  ornaments,  the  endless  variety  of 
colors,  the  Asiatic  character  of  the  various  temples  of 
pleasure,  the  tropical  luxuriance  of  the  foliage;  the 
gfeaming  white  statuary;  the  gay  company;  the  soft 
strains  of  music — all  combine  to  make  a  scene  of  won 
derful  enchantment.  High,  overhead,  dimly  visible 
through  the  tops  of  the  trees,  the  sky  wears  a  rich, 
strange,  almost  preternatural  aspect,  in  the  short  sum 
mer  nights.  A  soft,  golden  glow,  flushes  upward  from 
the  horizon,  and  lying  outspread  over  the  firmament, 
gives  a  peculiar  spectral  effect  to  the  gentler  and  more 
delicate  sheen  of  the  moon.  The  stars  shrink  back 
into  the  dim  infinity,  as  if  unable  to  contend  with  the 
grander  and  more  glowing  effulgence  of  the  great  orb 
that  rules  the  night;  and  the  rapt  spectator  is  uncon 
scious  whether  the  day  is  waning  into  the  night  or  the 
night  into  the  morning.  All  is  a  grand  anomaly — a 
rich,  strange,  and  inexplicable  combination  of  the 
glories  of  art  with  the  wonders  of  nature. — y.  Ross 
Browne. 


VI. 

SOCIETY  AND  THE  STATE. 


PART    VI. 

SOCIETY  AND  THE  STATE. 


165.  DUELING. — I  utter  my  unqualified  condemna- 
ture  of  the  code  which  offers  to  personal  vindictiveness 
a  life  due  only  to  a  country,  a  family,  and  to  God.  If 
I  were,  under  any  circumstances,  an  advocate  for  a 
duel,  it  should  be  at  least  a  fair,  equal  and  honorable 
duel.  If,  as  was  said  by  an  eloquent  advocate  in  its 
favor,  "  it  was  the  light  of  past  ages,  which  shed  its 
radiance  upon  the  hill-tops  of  civilization,,  although  its 
light  might  be  lost  in  the  dark  shade  of  the  valleys 
below,"  I  still  maintain  that  a  duel  should  be  fair  and 
equal;  that  skill  should  not  be  matched  against  igno 
rance,  practical  training  against  its  absence.  No  duel 
should  stand  the  test  of  public  opinion,  independent  of 
the  law,  except  the  great  element  of  equality  is  there. 
In  the  pursuits  of  common  life,  no  one  not  trained  to  a 
profession  is  supposed  to  be  a  match  for  a  professional 
man  in  the  duties  of  his  profession.  I  am  no  match  for 
a  physician  in  any  matters  connected  with  his  pursuits, 
nor  would  a  physician  be  a  match  for  me  in  a  legal 
argument.  The  civilian  not  trained  to  the  use  of  arms 
is  no  match  for  the  soldier;  nor,  although  his  courage  is 
equal,  and  he  may  have  a  profound  conviction  that  he 


182  CALIFORNIA   ANTHOLOGY. 

is  right,  will,  therefore,  the  contest  be  rendered  equal 
and  just.  I  denounce  the  system  itself,  because  it 
loses  annually  hundreds  of  valuable  lives,  and,  in  the 
present  state  of  civilization,  it  does  no  good,  profits 
nothing,  arrests  no  evil,  but  impels  a  thousand  evils; 
but,  above  all,  do  I  protest  against  any  contests  of  this 
nature  where,  in  skill,  knowledge  of  weapons,  or  from 
any  cause,  the  parties  are  not  equal  in  all  the  conditions 
of  that  stern  debate. 

The  code  of  honor  is  a  delusion  and  a  snare.  It 
palters  with  the  hope  of  a  true  courage,  and  binds  it  at 
the  feet  of  crafty  and  cruel  skill.  It  surrounds  its 
victim  with  the  pomp  and  grace  of  the  procession,  but 
leaves  him  bleeding  on  the  altar.  It  substitutes  cold 
and  deliberate  preparation  for  courageous  and  manly 
impulse,  and  arms  the  one  to  disarm  the  other.  It  may 
prevent  fraud  between  practiced  duelists,  who  should 
be  forever  without  its  pale ;  but  it  makes  the  mere 
"  trick  of  the  weapon "  superior  to  the  noblest  cause 
and  the  truest  courage.  Its  pretence  of  equality  is  a 
lie.  It  is  equal  in  all  the  form,  it  is  unequal  in  all  the 
substance.  The  habitude  of  arms,  the  early  training, 
the  frontier  life,  the  border  war,  the  sectional  custom, 
the  life  of  leisure — all  these  are  advantages  which  no 
negotiation  can  neutralize  and  which  no  courage  can 
overcome. 

Whatever  there  is,  in  the  code  of  honor  or  out  of  it, 
that  demands  or  allows  a  deadly  combat  where  there  is 
not  in  all  things  entire  and  certain  equality,  is  a  prosti 
tution  of  the  name,  is  an  evasion  of  the  substance,  and 


SOCIETY  AND  THE  STATE.  183 

is   a  shield,   blazoned  with   the  name  of  Chivalry,   to 
cover  the  malignity  of  murder. — Gen.  E.  D.  Baker. 

166.  POPULAR  CORRUPTION. — For   a   lying   press, 
for  iniquitous  politicians,  and  an  ignorant  pulpit,  for  the 
absurdities  of  fashion  and  the   injustice  of  society,  for 
prostitution,     for    gambling,     for     thieving,     for     the 
knaveries  of  the  scheming  capitalist,  the  grinding  of 
monopolists,   and  the  swindlings  of   corporations,   the 
people  have  only  themselves  to   blame,   for   all    these 
enormities  spring  from  the  people  and  exist   only  on 
the  sufferance  of  the  people. — Hubert  H.  Bancroft. 

167.  POPULAR  JUSTICE. — I   have  the  fullest  confi 
dence    in   the    ultimate  justice   and   judgment  of  the 
people.      I  am  not  afraid  of  them  at  all.     Sometimes, 
when  they  do  not  understand,  they  stone  the  prophets, 
revile  earnest  reformers,  and  hang  innocent  men;  but 
when,  too  late,  they  discover  their  error,  they  return  in 
surging  multitudes,   build  costly  monuments  over  the 
victims  of  their  phrenzy,  plant  sweet  blooming  flowers, 
and  water  them  with  their  tears.     When  the  Athenian 
populace  had  accused  Aristides  of  conspiracy,  and  had 
banished  him  from  the  Capital,   they   found   out  their 
mistake,  and   called   him   back   with  acclamation;  and 
when,   in  the  theater  that   night,   the  actor  spoke  of  a 
true  patriot  and  a  just  man,   the  whole  audience   rose 
and   turned   toward    the   exile.      That   was  the    most 
triumphant  hour  in  the  life  of  the   warrior  and  states 
man — grander,  more  glorious,  more  exultant  than  that 
of   Marathon.      Some   years  ago  the  people   of  San 


184  CALIFORNIA    ANTHOLOGY. 

Francisco  chased  away  an  eloquent  old  man,  (Gen.  E. 
D.  Baker — EDITOR,)  who  took  refuge  in  the  mountains 
of  Nevada.  He  was  afterwards  brought  back  from 
the  sacrificial  heights  of  Stone  River,  a.  mangled  and 
speechless  prophet  of  freedom,  and  fifty  thousand  peo 
ple  laid  him  tenderly  on  the  altitudes  of  Lone  Mount 
ain,  within  hearing  of  the  eternal  dirges  of  the  ocean- 
while  his  glorious  declaration  echoed  and  still  echoes 
in  the  valleys  and  mountains  from  the  fountains  of  the 
San  Joaquin  to  the  sources  of  the  Columbia:  "Years, 
years  ago,  I  took  my  stand  by  Freedom,  and  where  in 
youth  my  feet  were  planted,  there  my  manhood  and 
my  age  shall  march." — Gen.  John  A.  Collins. 

168.  CATHOLICITY  OF  SPIRIT.  —  Momus  blamed 
Jupiter  because,  when  he  made  man  he  put  no  window 
in  his  breast  through  which  the  heart  might  be  seen. 
Momus  was  a  sleepy  god;  and  we  mortals  are  likewise 
troubled  with  a  lack  of  insight  into  human  character. 
No  doubt  Jupiter  should  have  done  better.  Man  is  far 
from  a  perfect  creation.  But  as  the  gods  saw  fit  to  do 
no  more  for  us,  thanking  them  for  what  they  have  done, 
may  we  not  now  do  something  for  ourselves  ?  Were 
not  the  eyes  of  Momus  somewhat  at  fault,  as  well  as  the 
fingers  of  Jupiter?  If  we  lay  aside  the  narrowing 
prejudices  of  birth  and  education,  under  the  influences 
of  which  it  is  impossible  to  balance  nicely  the  actions 
of  men,  may  we  not  discover  here  and  there  openings 
into  the  soul?  The  homily  of  glowing  patriot  or  zeal 
ous  sectarian,  is  not  history,  but  verbiage.  Let  all 
that  is  worthy  of  censure  in  state,  church  and  society, 


SOCIETY    AND    THE    STATE.  185 

be  condemned;  let  all  that  is  worthy  of  praise  be  ex 
tolled;  but  let  not  censure  and  praise  be  meted  out  ac 
cording  to  the  maxims  of -country  or  creed.  Let  us 
meet  every  age  and  nation  upon  the  broad  platform  of 
humanity,  measuring  no  man's  conscience  by  our  own, 
but  by  the  conscience  of  nature,  and  condemning  cruelty 
and  injustice  wherever  we  find  it,  whether  in  Hebrew, 
Turk,  Christian,  Spaniard,  or  Anglo-Saxon.  I  hold  it 
to  be  no  less  unwise  than  dishonest  to  wage  vitupera 
tive  warfare  against  any  nation  or  sect,  as  such. 
Would  he  keep  pellucid  the  stream  of  thought,  with 
his  piety  and  patriotism,  the  writer  of  history  will  have 
little  to  do. — Hubert  H.  Bancroft. 

169.  SOCIAL    ARTIFICES. — It  is    all  very  well  for 
those  who  are  perched  upon  the  highest  pinnacles  to  fling 
out  the  old  aphorism,   that  water  will  always  reach   its 
level.     They  forget,  for  the  nonce,  that  \i  is  quite  possi 
ble  to  force  water  above  its  level  by  artificial  appliances, 
and  to  keep  it  there,  for  a  time,   at  least.      Hydraulic 
pressure  lends  a  momentum  quite  equal  to  the  attain 
ment  of  such  results.      Not  more  difficult  is  it  to   pre 
vent  water  from  reaching  its   level,  by  shutting  it  out 
almost  entirely,  by    the    construction   of  coffer   dams. 
There  are  hydraulic  rams  constantly  at  work  amid  the 
complicated    machinery  of  society;     and  their    potent 
moving  force  is  felt  in   the  uplifting  of  many  a  dead 
weight  into  a  hateful  prominence,  that  would  otherwise 
lie  prone  at  the  bottom. — Sarah  B.  Cooper. 

170.  MODERN   CIVILIZATION. — It  may   be  a  con 
tested  point  whether  modern  civilization   is  more  pro- 


186  CALIFORNIA   ANTHOLOGY. 

ductive  of  human  happiness  and  morality  than  of  vice 
and   misery.      It   is   true  that  culture   and  refinement, 
while    they    broaden    the    scope    of  joys  and    duties, 
and    stimulate    the    moral    and    intellectual    attributes, 
must  increase  the  capabilities  of  crime.     The  educated 
villain   can    accomplish    more    evil    than   the  ignorant 
knave  can  conceive.     The  heart  of  the  cultivated  and 
refined  man  can  feel  keener  pangs  than   the  benighted 
and    blunted    sensibilities    of   the   primitive    boor   can 
imagine.      But  herein  may  lie   the  fallacy:     It  is   not   ] 
that  enlightenment  increases  disproportionately  crime  j 
over  virtue,   sorrow   over  gladness,  but  that  it  illumi-   ; 
nates,  and  brings  into   such   hideous  contrast,   the  ex 
tremes,  so  that  we   forget  the  bright,   while  we  look 
lamentingly  on  the  dark  side  of  the  picture.     Those  of 
us  who  are  of  the  Pioneers  of  '50  and  '52,   know  from 
experience,   without  the  aid   of  rhetoric   or  logic,   the 
change  for  good  which    the   humanizing  influences   of 
cultivated,  social  and  intellectual   society   has  wrought 
here  in  California.     Where  once  the  jingling  of  gold  j 
in  the  gambling  dens  constituted  the   Sabbath   music,; 
broken  now   and   then   by   the  muttered   oath   or  the 
shrieks  of  dying  men,  are  now  heard  the  swelling  tones  i 
of  the   organ  mingling  with   the   voices  of  the  wor-j 
shipers  of  God. — Nathaniel  Bennett. 

171.  CONTINUOUS  SOCIAL  ADVANCE. — In  the  pres 
ent  state  of  knowledge,  the  mystery  of  civilization,  or 
social  progress,  like  all  the  phenomena  of  evolution,  is 
unexplainable ;  and  whatever  opinion  we  may  hold  as 
to  natural  agencies,  and  supernatural  interpositions,  we 


SOCIETY  AND  THE  STATE.  187 

can  best  see  marked  by  the  centuries,  a  permanent  and 
continuous  unfolding  and  improvement,  acting  under 
laws  as  fixed  as  those  which  regulate  siderial  systems. 
Yet  though  predetermined  and  fixed  in  its  efforts  and 
results,  like  the  plant  artificially  dwarfed  or  improved, 
progress  may  be  hindered  or  accelerated  by  the  charac 
ter  of  individuals  and  the  politics  of  society.  Social 
disruptions,  moral  earthquakes,  mobs,  murders,  and  out 
raged  law,  no  less  than  literature,  art,  industry,  and 
wealth,  in  their  action  and  reaction  on  each  other,  fer 
tilize  intellect  and  stimulate  intellectual  growth. 

— Hubert  H.  Bancroft. 

172.  OUR  MORAL  INHERITANCE. — The  geologists 
say  that  the  earth's  surface  is  made  up  of  layers  of 
sandstone,  limestone,  chalk  and  marl,  the  products  of 
successive  deposits.  The  moral  world  is  as  truly  made 
up  of  layers  of  opinions  hardened  into  beliefs ;  of  senti 
ments,  and  thoughts.  The  best  father  of  most  of  us  is 
pur  great  past.  A  man  endowed  with  millions  and 
with  boundless  square  leagues  of  real  estate,  but  with 
the  civilization  that  he  inherits  all  cancelled,  is  poorer 
than  the  poorest  citizen  surrounded  by,  and  partaking 
in,  our  civilization.  Better  for  us  to  lose  the  whole  of 
our  army  and  navy,  and  that  all  our  ports  be  laid  waste, 
than  that  one  per  cent,  be  abated  of  our  respect  for  the 
forms  of  a  public  meeting,  of  our  regard  for  law,  of  our 
love  of  home,  of  our  dread  of  riot  and  anarchy.  In 
the  one  case  we  part  with  the  evidences  and  immediate 
instruments  of  our  power,  which  may  be  replenished  ; 
in  the  other  we  part  with  the  forces  that  we  have 
inherited  from  ages. — Thomas  Starr  King. 


188  CALIFORNIA    ANTHOLOGY. 

173.  WINE. — This  conglomerate  which  you  call 
society  is  hanging  out  a  great  many  flags  of  distress. 
It  babbles  incoherently  of  perfectibility,  and  goes 
straightway  to  the  bad.  Are  those  reformers  going  to 
save  the  world,  who,  either  through  intemperance  of 
speech  or  drink,  must  needs  be  moderated  by  a  padlock 
put  upon  their  mouths  ?  Nor  is  it  safe,  just  now,  to 
calculate  the  results  of  this  feminine  gospel  of  vitupera 
tion.  The  back  of  the  body  politic  may  be  the  better 
for  having  a  fly-blister  laid  on;  and  it  might,  perhaps, 
as  well  be  done  by  feminine  hands  as  by  any  other. 
But  there  are  some  evils  too  deep  for  surface  remedies. 
If,  for  instance,  vineyards  are  going  to  curse  the  people, 
as  my  moralizing  friend  insists,  then  humanity  here 
about  is  in  a  bad  way,  and  needs  reconstructing  from 
the  nethermost  parts  to  the  bald  crown  of  the  head. 
Why,  a  little  generous  wine  ought  to  enrich  the  blood 
and  inspire  nobility  of  thought.  If  it  does  more  than 
this — if  it  becomes  a  demon  to  drive  men  and  hogs 
into  the  sea — then  it  is  evident  that  both  were  on  too 
low  a  plane  of  existence  for  any  safe  exaltation. 
But  shall  the  vineyards  be  rooted  up  for  all  this  ? 
It  is  better  to  drown  the  swine,  and  let  the  grapes 
still  grow  purple  upon  the  hill-sides.  Oh,  my 
friend,  with  thin  and  impoverished  blood!  do  not  pinch 
this  question  up  in  the  vise  of  your  morality.  No 
doubt  there  was  a  vineyard  in  Eden,  and  there  were 
ripe  clusters  close  by  the  fig  leaves.  You  cannot  prove 
to  me  that  sinless  hands  have  not  plucked  the  grapes, 
and  that  millions  will  not  do  it  again.  What  we  need 
is  not  a  greater  company  of  wailing  prophets,  but  men 


SOCIETY    AND    THE    STATE.  189 

who  will  reveal  to  us  the  higher  and   nobler  use  of 
things. — Rev.    W.   C.  Bartlett. 

174.  CONSERVATIVES   AND    RADICALS. — How  con 
stantly  the  different  classes  of  mind  are  supplied.     Con 
servatives    and  radicals  are  made  so  more  by  nature 
than   by  argument.     Some  are   born   to  hark   for  the 
tramp  of  new  truths,  to  watch  for  gleams  of  new  reve 
lations;    others  are  born  to  live  with  their  faces  nobly 
turned  to  the  past.      No    nation   is   without   her  pro 
gressive  party,  and  no  community,  however  fast,  with 
out  its  party  of  conservatives.      If  all  were   bound   to 
go  ahead,  our  growth  would  be  like  the  gourds.      If 
the  Hunker  element  were  in  excess,  the  tree  would  be 
all  gnarls  and  knots.    Where  both  are  present,  we  have 
society  like  an  oak,  believing  in   air  and   leaves,  with 
tough,  wide-spreading  limbs  and  twigs  that  respond  to 
every  breeze,  and  coarse,   rough  bark  and   roots  that 
mine  the  earth  and  fill  the  soil.      If  the  bold  critics  of 
governments,  if  the  agitators  were  all  lost  from  the  com 
munity  for  a  century,  we  should  be  like  a  train  of  cars 
without  an  engine,  rotting  on  the  track;    but  with  noth 
ing  but  agitators  in  a  State,  we  are  like  a  line  of  loco 
motives  without  a  car,  bound  to  tear  on,  so  long  as  fuel 
and  track  hold  out. — Thos.  Starr  King. 

175.  THE  CAUSE  CALLS   FORTH  THE   MAN. — All 
the  efforts  of  Science  have  failed  to  trace  back  of  itself 
the  springs  and  sources  of  that  subtle  thing  that  we  call 
life  and  know  not  what  it  is.     So  far  as  we  can  go  is  to 
discern  back  of  each  living  .thing  some  other  living 


190  CALIFORNIA   ANTHOLOGY. 

thing.  Yet  so  widely  are  its  germs  scattered,  that, 
given  but  the  conditions  that  support  it,  and  there  will 
life  appear.  And  so  it  seems  in  the  moral  world. 
Whenever  in  human  history  occasion  and  opportunity 
wait  the  man,  forth  he  steps,  and  as  the  common 
worker  is  on  need  transformed  into  a  queen  bee,  so 
when  circumstances  are  favorable,  what  might  other 
wise  pass  for  a  common  man,  rises  into  hero  or  leader, 
sage  or  saint.  So  widely  has  the  sower  scattered  the 
good  seed;  so  strong  is  the  germinative  force  that  bids 
it  bud  and  blossom.  But,  alas !  for  the  stony  ground, 
and  the  weeds  and  the  tares !  For  one  who  attains 
his  full  stature,  how  many  are  stunted  and  deformed ! 

—Henry  George. 

176.  ONE-SIDED  PROGRESS. — The  winds  do  our 
bidding,  and  the  occult  pulses  of  the  earth  carry  our 
words;  we  weigh  the  sun  and  analyze  the  stars.  One 
after  another,  mightier  genii  than  those  that  arise  in 
Arabian  Story  have  bowed  to  the  call  of  the  lamp  of 
knowledge.  And  yet  they  throng  and  come,  powers 
more  vast,  in  shapes  more  towering.  But  to  what  end  ? 
Look  to  the  van  of  progress,  where  the  conditions  to 
which  all  progressive  countries  are  tending  are  most 
fully  realized,  where  wealth  is  most  abundant  and  popu 
lation  densest — the  great  cities,  where  one  may  walk 
through  miles  of  palaces,  where  are  the  grandest 
churches,  the  greatest  libraries,  the  highest  levels  of 
luxury,  and  refinement,  and  education,  and  culture. 
Amid  the  greatest  accumulations  of  wealth  men  die  of 
starvation,  and  women  prowl  the  streets  to  buy  bread 


SOCIETY    AND    THE    STATE.  191 

with  shame ;  in  factories,  where  labor-saving  machinery 
shows  the  last  march  of  ingenuity,  little  children  are  at 
work  who  ought  to  be  at  play;  where  the  new  forces 
are  most  fully  realized,  large  classes  are  doomed  to 
pauperism  or  live  just  on  its  verge,  while  everywhere 
the  all-absorbing  chase  of  wealth,  shows  the  force  of 
the  fear  of  want,  and  from  altars  dedicated  to  the  Liv 
ing  God  leers  the  molten  image  of  the  Golden  Calf. 

Progress  thus  one-sided  is  not  real,  and  cannot  last. 
No  chain  is  stronger  than  its  weakest  link.  If  the  low 
are  not  brought  up,  the  high  shall  be  pulled  down. 
This  is  the  attraction  of  gravitation  of  the  moral  uni 
verse;  it  is  the  fiat  of  the  eternal  justice  that  rules  the 
world.  It  stands  forth  in  the  history  of  every  civiliza 
tion  that  has  had  its  day  and  run  its  course.  It  is  what 
the  Sphinx  says  to  us  as  she  sitteth  in  desert  sand,  while 
the  winged  bulls  of  Nineveh  bear  her  witness!  It  is 
written  in  the  undecipherable  hieroglyphics  of  Yucatan, 
in  the  brick  mounds  of  Babylon,  in  the  prostrate  Col 
umns  of  Persepolis,  in  the  salt-sown  plain  of  Carthage. 
It  speaks  to  us  from  the  shattered  relics  of  Grecian 
art,  from  the  ruins  of  the  Coliseum ! — Henry  George. 

177.  THE  DECAY  OF  EMPIRES. — Science  teaches 
that  invisible  things  are  more  substantial  than  visible, 
and  truth  is  the  food  of  all  that  is  substantial.  Nations 
have  seldom  been  drawn  and  quartered  while  in  good 
health;  they  generally  die  of  disease.  If  true  coroners' 
verdicts  were  written  on  the  tombstones  of  kingdoms, 
the  theories  of  sensuous  history  would  be  sadly  contra 
dicted.  Babylon  died  of  delirium  tremens;  rum  did  it; 
13 


192  CALIFORNIA    ANTHOLOGY. 

in  a  single  night  she  staggered  to  her  ruin.  Nineveh 
was  killed  by  apoplexy;  Macedon  died  of  a  raging 
fever;  Egypt  of  gluttony  and  gout;  Rome  of  dropsy. 
We  might  go  further,  and  make  the  diagnoses  of  dis 
eases  that  are  threatening  living  nations. —  Thos.  Starr 
King. 

178.  PATRIOTISM. — The  life-and-death-struggle  of 
a  free  people  to  preserve  their  country  is  an  event 
angels  might  weep  and  yet  exult  to  see.  Heroism 
defying  wounds  and  death,  pouring  out  its  life  blood 
freely,  is  the  inspiration  of  country.  Two  ideas  there 
are  which,  above  all  others,  elevate  and  dignify  a  race, 
the  idea  of  God  and  the  idea  of  Country.  How 
imperishable  is  the  idea  of  country!  How  does  it  live 
within  and  ennoble  the  heart  in  spite  of  persecutions 
and  trials,  and  difficulties  and  dangers !  After  two 
thousand  years  of  wandering,  it  makes  the  Jew  a  sharer 
in  the  glory  of  the  prophets,  the  lawgivers,  the  warriors 
and  poets,  who  lived  in  the  morning  of  time.  How 
does  it  toughen  every  fiber  of  an  Englishman's  frame, 
and  imbue  the  spirit  of  Frenchmen  with  Napoleonic 
enthusiasm.  How  does  the  German  carry  with  him 
even  the  old  house  furniture  of  the  Rhine,  surround 
himself  with  the  sweet  and  tender  associations  of 
Fatherland,  and,  wheresoever  he  may  be,  the  great 
names  of  German  history  shine  like  stars  in  the  heaven 
above  him.  And  the  Irishman,  though  the  political 
existence  of  his  country  is  merged  in  a  kingdom  whose 
rule  he  may  abhor,  yet  still  do  the  chords  of  his  heart 
vibrate  reponsive  to  the  tones  of  the  harp  of  Erin,  and 


SOCIETY    AND    THE    STATE.  193 

the  lowly  shamrock  is  dearer  to  his  soul  than  the  fame- 
crowning  laurel,  the  love-breathing  myrtle,  or  the 
storm-daring  pine.  What  is  our  country  ?  Not  alone 
the  land  and  the  sea,  the  lakes  and  rivers,  and  valleys 
and  mountains — not  alone  the  people,  their  customs  and 
laws— not  alone  the  memories  of  the  past,  the  hopes  of 
the  future;  it  is  something  more  than  all  these  com 
bined.  It  is  a  divine  abstraction.  You  cannot  tell 
what  it  is,  but  let  its  flag  rustle  above  your  head,  you 
feel  its  living  presence  in  your  hearts.  They  tell  us 
that  our  country  must  die;  that  the  sun  and  stars  will 
look  down  upon  the  Great  Republic  no  more;  that 
already  (A.  D.  1862 — EDITOR)  the  black  eagles  of  despo 
tism  are  gathering  in  our  political  sky.  That  even 
now  kings  and  emperors  -are  casting  lots  for  the  gar 
ments  of  our  national  glory.  It  shall  not  be!  Not  yet, 
not  yet,  shall  the  nations  lay  the  bleeding  corpse  of  our 
country  in  the  tomb.  If  they  could,  angels  would  roll 
the  stone  from  the  mouth  of  the  sepulcher.  It  would 
burst  the  casements  of  the  grave,  and  come  forth  a 
living  presence,  redeemed,  regenerated,  disenthralled. 
Not  yet,  not  yet,  shall  the  Republic  die.  The  heavens 
are  not  darkened,  the  stones  are  not  rent!  It  shall 
live — it  shall  live,  the  incarnation  of  freedom,  it  shall 
live  the  embodiment  of  the  power  and  majesty  of  the 
people.  Baptized  anew,  it  shall  live  a  thousand  years 
to  come,  the  Colossus  of  the  nations — its  feet  upon  the 
continents,  its  scepter  over  the  seas,  its  forehead  among 
the  stars  ! — Newton  Booth. 

179.     PATRIOTISM  is  but  a  reflex  of  egoism,  and  re 
spect  for  statutes  and  constitutions  is  but  another  form 


194  CALIFORNIA    ANTHOLOGY. 

of  loyalty.  And  as  excessive  love  of  country  is  simply 
excessive  self-love,  so  undue  worship  of  forms  of  %  law 
is  nothing  more  than  a  part  of  that  superstitious  loyalty 
which  ot  old  held  to  the  doctrine  of  divine  kingship. 
If  reverence  is  any  whose  due,  whatever  good  there 
may  be  in  loyalty,  in  that  sentiment  which  unites  indi 
viduals  under  a  common  head,  it  is  not  the  power  of 
law  which  should  be  reverenced,  but  the  power  which 
creates  and  sustains  law.  This  doctrine  of  divine  king 
ship  appears  in  a  sort  of  inverted  form  in  the  mind  of 
the  Athenian  who  held  it  wrong  for  a  man  to  rise  above 
his  fellows — whence  ostracism,  or  oyster-shell  voting  a 
great  man  out  of  the  country. — -Hubert  H.  Bancroft. 

ISO.  POLITICS. — The  pursuit  of  politics  is  delusive 
and  full  of  temptation.  No  man  should  forget  the 
duty  he  owes  his  country,  but  all  should  remember  that 
they  owe  a  duty  to  themselves.  When  men,  more  par 
ticularly  young  men,  see  a  great  statesman  stand  forth 
in  the  midst  of  a  listening  senate,  and  mark  the  stamp 
which  he  makes  upon  the  public  mind,  and  upon  the 
policy  of  the  country,  by  the  force  of  his  intellectual 
vigor,  they  are  apt  to  forget  the  labors  by  which  that 
proud  position  has  been  achieved ;  to  forget  how  many 
have  sought  to  attain  such  a  lofty  place  and  have 
failed;  and  to  forget  that  he  who  is  filling  their  minds 
with  admiration  may  be  on  the  eve  of  a  sudden  fall. 
Politics  should  not  be  the  pursuit,  I  mean  the  only 
pursuit,  of  any  man.  Representative  honors,  official 
station,  should  only  be  the  occasional  reward,  or  the 
occasional  sacrifice;  and  if,  forgetting  this  rule,  young 


SOCIETY  AND  THE  STATE.  195 

men  attempt  to  make  politics  their  only  hope,  with  the 
probability  that  in  many  cases  they  will  fail,  and  that, 
if  successful,  they  will  surely  be  exposed  to  a  thousand 
temptations ;  if  they  love  excitement  for  its  own  sake — 
the  noisy  meetings,  the  conventions,  the  elections — this 
love  for  excitement  will  grow  upon  them,  and  they  will 
soon  be  upon  the  high  road  to  ruin.  If  anyone  is  de 
termined  to  achieve  distinction  in  politics,  let  him  first 
obtain  a  competency  in  some  trade,  profession,  or  pur 
suit,  and  then,  even  if  unsuccessful  in  politics,  the  mis 
step  will  not  be  irretrievable. — Gen.  E.  D.  Baker. 

181.  FREE  TRADE. — Free  trade,  the  right  to  buy 
in  the  cheapest  and  sell  in  the  dearest  market,  is  based 
upon  a  fundamental  law,  as  inexorable  as  death,  and  the 
violation  of  which  is  inevitably  followed  by  severe  ret 
ribution.  This  law  no  nation  can  overlook.  It  is  the 
same  law  which  gives  to  a  man  the  right  to  enjoy  life 
and  to  hold  property  without  restrictions,  except  such 
as  are  absolutely  needed  for  the  benefit  of  the  whole 
community  of  which  he  forms  a  part.  When  a  govern 
ment  oversteps  these  limits,  for  the  benefit  of  a  particu 
lar  class,  it  in  effect  destroys  rights  which  are  inherent  in 
the  people,  and  with  which  no  interference  can  be  justi 
fied.  Commerce  should  be  as  free  as  the  air  we  breathe. 
Its  arms  should  extend  to  every  spot  upon  the  globe 
where  human  beings  exist;  and  should  have  the  right 
to  grasp,  unchecked,  whatever  can  contribute  to  the 
happiness  of  men.  The  only  regulations  it  requires 
are  those  which  spring  from  the  natural  laws  of  supply 
and  demand.  Beyond  these,  all  interference  with  its 


196  CALIFORNIA   ANTHOLOGY. 

operation  is  simply  prescriptive  and  semi-barbarous; 
because,  in  addition  to  other  arguments,  it  checks  the 
progress  of  civilization.  Commerce  is  the  great  civil- 
izer  of  the  world.  By  facilitating  intercourse  and  the 
free  interchange  of  commodities,  it  conveys  the  great 
truths  of  progress  into  every  land  and  over  every  sea. 
It  knits  humanity  together;  and  by  the  very  sympa 
thies  and  interests  it  generates,  tends  to  render  war, 
which  destroys  what  peace  creates,  impossible.  That 
commerce  must  be  free,  is  a  decree  of  nature,  before 
which  all  must  bow;  so  that  as  it  scatters  broadcast  the 
blessings  of  liberty,  science  and  the  arts  may  cause 
knowledge  to  spread,  until  it  shall  cover  the  earth  as 
the  waters  cover  the  great  deep. — Henry  E.  Highton. 

182.  NATIONAL  CHARACTER. — The  great  thing  for 
statesmen  to  learn  as  a  primitive  fundamental  truth  is  this 
simple  fact — that  the  organization  of  a  State  is  not  effect 
ed  by  its  paper  bonds,  but  by  its  moral  bonds.  The  Crea 
tor  always  deals  with  a  state  as  a  great  person.  Laws 
are  ever  at  work  beneath  the  changes  of  its  inhabitants 
and  the  struggles  of  its  parties,  weaving  into  stable 
character  its  passing  experiences — character  which  is 
the  noblest  national  reward,  or  the  sternest  retribution. 
Individuals  are  never  conscious  of  this  law.  Very 
often  they  think  that  the  forces  of  a  nation's  life  are 
playing  at  haphazard.  But  the  law  plays  around  them, 
uses  them,  and  no  more  permits  a  state  to  begin  its  life 
anew  with  each  generation  than  it  allows  a  man  to  begin 
his  life  anew  after  each  night's  sleep.  It  is  the  glory  of 
the  human  intellect  that  it  can  detect  law  in  the  process 


SOCIETY    AND    THE    STATE.  197 

of  the  universe,  and  see  at  least  in  countless  threads  of 
order,  the  habits,  purposes,  and  expressions  of  a  crea 
tive  power.  Everywhere  we  turn  there  is  law,  and  the 
most  striking  expressions  of  it  are  in  what  we  often 
consider  to  be  the  region  of  chance  or  lawlessness. 
Running  up  through  the  realm  of  science  to  society, 
and  to  the  life  of  nations,  we  find  that  the  apex-truth 
which  the  intellect  discovers,  is  this  :  Character  is  of 
supreme  importance  for  national  growth,  prosperity  and 
stability.  How  impressive  does  history  seem  as  a 
study,  when  we  find  that  every  country  is  a  huge 
pedestal,  lifting  up  one  national  figure,  which  symbo 
lizes  the  prospects  and  the  perils  of  the  millions  that 
dwell  around  its  base. —  Thomas  Starr  King. 


CAPITAL  AND  LABOR. 

183.  Slavery  is  not  dead,  though  its  grosssst 
form  be  gone.  What  is  the  difference,  whether  my 
body  is  legally  held  by  another,  or  whether  he  legally 
holds  that  "by  which  alone  I  can  live?  Hunger  is  as 
cruel  as  the  lash.  The  essence  of  slavery  consists  in 
taking  from  a  man  all  the  fruits  of  his  labor  except  a 
bare  living,  and  of  how  many  thousands  miscalled  free  is 
this  the  lot?  Where  wealth  most  abounds  there  are 
classes  with  whom  the  average  plantation  negro  would 
have  lost  in  comfort  by  exchanging.  English  villeins 
in  the  Fourteenth  Century  were  better  off  than  Eng 
lish  agricultural  laborers  of  the  Nineteenth.  There  is 
slavery  and  slavery.  "The  widow,"  says  Carlyle,  "is 


198  CALIFORNIA   ANTHOLOGY. 

gathering  nettles  for  her  children's  dinner;  a  perfumed 
seigneur,  delicately  lounging  in  the  CEil  de  Bceuf,  has 
an  alchemy  whereby  he  will  extract  from  her  the  third 
nettle,  and  call  it  rent!" 

Let  us  not  be  deluded  by  names.  What  is  the  use 
of  a  republic  if  labor  must  stand  with  its  hat  off,  beg 
ging  leave  to  work;  if  "tramps"  must  throng  the 
highways  and  children  grow  up  in  squalid  tenement 
houses?  Political  institutions  are  but  means  to  an  end 
—the  freedom  and  happiness  of  the  individual;  and 
just  so  far  as  they  fail  in  that,  call  them  what  you  will, 
they  are  condemned. 

Our  conditions  are  changing.  The  laws  which  im 
pel  nations  to  seek  a  larger  measure  of  liberty,  or  else 
take  from  them  what  they  have,  are  working  silently 
but  with  irresistible  force.  If  we  would  perpetuate  the 
Republic,  we  must  come  up  to  the  spirit  of  the  Decla 
ration,  and  fully  recognize  the  equal  rights  of  all  men. 
We  must  free  labor  from  its  burdens  and  trade  from  its 
fetters;  we  must  cease  to  make  government  an  excuse 
for  enriching  the  few  at  the  expense  of  the  many,  and 
confine  it  to  necessary  functions.  We  must  cease  to 
permit  the  monopolization  of  land  and  water  by  non- 
users,  and  apply  the  just  rule,  "no  seat  reserved  unless 
occupied."  We  must  cease  the  cruel  wrong  which,  by 
first  denying  their  natural  rights,  reduces  laborers  to 
the  wages  of  competition,  and  then,  under  pretence  of 
asserting  the  rights  of  another  race,  compels  them  to  a 
competition  that  will  not  merely  force  them  to  a  stand 
ard  of  comfort  unworthy  the  citizen  of  a  free  Republic, 
but  ultimately  deprive  them  of  their  equal  right  to  live. 


SOCIETY  AND  THE  STATE.  199 

Here  is  the  test :  whatever  conduces  to  their  equal 
and  inalienable  rights  to  men  is  good — let  us  preserve 
it.  Whatever  denies  or  interferes  with  those  equal 
rights  is  bad — let  us  sweep  it  away.  If  we  thus  make 
our  institutions  consistent  with  their  theory,  all  difficul 
ties  must  vanish.  We  will  not  merely  have  a  republic, 
but  social  conditions  consistent  with  a  republic.  If  we 
will  not  do  this,  we  surrender  the  Republic,  either  to  be 
torn  by  the  volcanic  forces  that  already  shake  the 
ground  beneath  the  standing  armies  of  Europe,  or  to 
rot  by  slow  degrees,  and  in  its  turn  undergo  the  fate  of 
all  its  predecessors. — Henry  George. 

184.  THE  NECESSITIES  of  life,  the  wants  of  ad 
vancing  civilization,  open  a  scope  for  employment  wide 
as  humanity.  They  demand  the  fullest  exercise  of  the 
highest  energies  of  every  member  of  the  human  race. 
Let  Society  and  Government  seek  to  attain  an  organi 
zation  wherein  Labor  shall  be  elevated  to  its  true 
position,  and  its  claims  recognized  and  rewarded. 
Government  taxed  to  furnish  employment  ?  Why, 
national  prosperity  must  be  vitalized  every  moment  by 
increasing  toil,  or  the  value  that  capital  represents  would 
perish,  and  money  become  as  worthless  as  the  mere 
pictures  on  the  coins.  The  roots  of  the  tree  of  wealth 
must  be  continually  watered  by  the  sweat  of  the  labor 
er's  brow,  or  its  branches  would  die,  its  leaves  wither, 
and  its  golden  fruit  turn  to  ashes  on  the  lips  of  its 
possessor.  Let  labor  suspend  for  a  day,  and  the  world 
would  feel  the  shock.  Let  it  cease  for  a  month,  and  a 
crisis  would  come,  such  as  commerce  never  felt,  involv- 


200  CALIFORNIA   ANTHOLOGY. 

/ 

ing  banks,  moneyed  institutions,  and  national  credit  in 
common  ruin.  Let  it  be  idle  for  a  single  summer,  and 
terror  would  come  down  on  the  strong  and  the  weak, 
beauty  would  turn  pale  at  the  toilet,  eloquence  become 
dumb  in  the  Senate,  ships  would  open  their  seams,  the 
grass  grow  in  the  market-place,  and  the  nations  be  shaken 
to  their  foundations.  Anarchy,  bloody-handed  revolu 
tion,  grim  and  ghastly  famine,  would  shake  their  snaky 
locks  in  every  land.  Let  it  be  paralyzed  for  a  single 
year,  and  the  world  would  be  smitten  as  with  the  wrath 
of  God.  Jehovah,  in  his  awful  omnipotence,  could 
devise  no  curse  that  would  more  blast,  and  scorch,  and 
desolate  the  earth.  Not  Cotton  is  King;  nor  Gold. 
Labor  is  the  true  Monarch  of  the  world !  With  stal 
wart  frame  and  sinewy  arm,  and  face  bronzed  and 
scarred,  but  still  with  "  front  of  Jove  and  eye  like 
Mars,"  he  must  be  recrowned — crowned  in  the  starry 
temple  of  science — with  power  for  his  throne,  art  his 
sceptre,  and  wealth  his  sparkling  diadem. — Newton 
Booth. 


188.  THERE  is  NO  DOGMA,  nor  theory,  nor  de 
vice  under  the  sun,  upon  which  men  have  been 
so  universally  agreed  as  that  the  right  of  property  un 
derlies  all  true  religion,  government  and  civilization. 
Without  it,  deprived  of  all  motive  to  acquire  beyond 
the  most  absolute  necessity,  man  would  sink  into  the 
savagedom  from  which  it  has  taken  five  thousand  years 
to  raise  him.  The  justice  of  allowing  unlimited  acqui 
sition  is  evidenced  by  the  fact  that  the  desire  is  univer- 


SOCIETY   AND    THE    STATE.  201 

sal.      No  natural   inherent  quality   or  passion  is  ours 
without  there  is  lying  behind  it  a  benign  purpose. 

—James  McM.  Shafter. 

186.  IT  WOULD  BE  USELESS,  vicious  and  insane  to 
declaim  with  Proudhon  against  the  rights  of  property. 
Property  is  the  incentive  to  exertion.  It  is  the  stimu 
lant  which  is  the  preventive  of  idleness,  and  its  en 
joyment  should  be  the  just  reward  of  honest  in 
dustry.  Its  security  is  the  very  foundation  of  order. 
Take  it  away,  and  society  would  relapse  into  that  anar 
chy  which  is  worse  than  despotism.  It  would  be  idle 
and  visionary  to  join  with  Rousseau  in  his  sentimental 
praises  of  barbarism.  One  Shakespeare,  or  Newton, 
or  Fulton,  or  Washington,  were  worth  all  the  savage 
tribes  that  ever  lived.  The  world  was  not  made  for 
savages,  but  for  men.  We  must  not  recede  to  a  lower 
civilization,  but  advance  to  a  higher;  the  type  must  not 
be  broken,  but  improved.  The  means  of  production 
must  continue  to  increase,  but  the  principles'of  distribu 
tion  must  become  fair  and  equitable;  the  paradox  that 
riches  and  poverty  increase  in  the  same  ratio  must  be 
disproved.  Wealth  must  not  be  diverted  into  reser 
voirs  to  stagnate,  but  flow  out  in  living  streams,  perpet 
ual  rivers  of  abundance,  making  the  landscape  beauti 
ful,  the  fields  green  and  fruitful,  and  all  the  people  glad. 
Communists,  socialists  and  Fourierists,  have  grappled 
with  these  difficulties  in  vain.  Associations,  phalanxes 
and  communities,  however  beautiful  in  theory,  have 
failed  in  their  application  to  the  facts  of  human  nature. 
Society  can  never  be  modeled  upon  an  invented  plan ; 


202  CALIFORNIA    ANTHOLOGY. 

it  always  casts  itself  in  the  mould  of  necessity — it  obeys 
its  own  laws.     We  must  seek  in  itself,  in  the   ingredi 
ents  as  they  are,  for  the  powers  and  agencies  that  shall 
evolve  its  improvements.     Among  these  powers,  what 
ever  tends  to  diffuse  the  privileges  that  have  been  con 
centrated,  to  scatter  broadcast  the  blessings  that  have 
been  garnered  up,  will  be  a  noble  and  efficient  instru 
mentality  for  good.     A   free   pulpit,   speaking   to   the 
great  heart  of  the  people,  a  religion  that  goes  into  the 
highways  and   byways,   free   schools  whose  doors  are 
open  to  the   children  of  all,   a  free  press  sending    its 
streams  of  literature  to  every  man's  home,  science  pop 
ularized  until   its  great   truths  blend    with   the  public 
mind,  mechanical  arts  approaching  that  perfection  that 
will  so  cheapen   the  commodities  they  manufacture  as 
to  place  them   within  the  reach  of  all;  life  and  health 
assurances  and  insurances,  enabling  the  laborer  to  free 
himself  and  family  from  the  crushing  fear  of  want  in  the 
hour  of  sickness  and  calamity;  saving  societies,  whereby 
small  sums  can  be  made  productive,  and  by  their  aggre 
gation  compete  with  individual  wealth,  are  all  remedial 
agencies  whose  influence  will  widen  and  deepen  as  they 
become  more  universal  and  permanent.     And  if,  while 
new  inventions  continue  to   increase  man's  individual 
ability,  the  laws  of  distribution  are  made  active,  just  as 
the  powers  of  production  are  active,  and  labor  receive 
its  fair  reward,  there  need  be  no  fear  that  society  will 
lapse  towards  barbarism  in  the  pursuit  of  happiness,  no 
fear  that  phrenzied  passions  will  destroy  the  rights  of 
property  in  vindication  of  the    rights  of  man,   no  fear 
that   the  seats  at  the  table  of  life   will  all  be   taken. 


SOCIETY    AND    THE    STATE.  '     203 

There  will  be  room  for  all  who  come,  at  the  bountiful 
board  which  nature  will  continue  to  spread,  until  the 
last  syllable  of  recorded  time. — Neivion  Booth. 

187.  So  FAR  as  the  labor  question,  as  it  is  called, 
or  labor  and  capital,  is  concerned  with  social  discontent, 
there  can  be  no  settlement  on  any  present  terms  of 
labor  and  capital.  It  is  no  local  question,  but  of  uni 
versal  human  interest,  and  pervades  Christendom.  The 
only  reconciliation  of  that  difficulty  is  in  moving  for 
ward  on  to  a  new  ground,  where  the  moral  relations  of 
employer  and  workman  are  recognized  as  clearly  as  the 
politico-economic  relation.  What  men  want  is  a  respect 
ful  consideration  of  their  welfare,.  It  does  not  consist 
in  the  government  taking  them  up,  and  finding  work  for 
all  who  want  it.  A  parental  government  is  a  monarchy 
or  a  despotism  where  men  cannot  take  care  of  them 
selves;  but  in  a  free  State  men  are  supposed  to  be  of 
age  and  able  to  take  care  of  themselves.  Capital  and 
labor  will  never  be  at  peace,  nor  will  they  ever  reap 
their  full  rewards  until  they  have  a  material  and  moral 
interest  in  each  other's  welfare  over  and  above  the 
wages  paid  on  the  one  hand,  or  the  service  rendered  on 
the  other.  The  final  goal  is  not  parental  government, 
nor  socialism,  nor  communism,  nor  trades-unions,  but 
co-operation.  This  will  not  be  accomplished  primarily 
by  legislation,  but  it  will  be  begun  here  and  there  by 
enlightened  men  of  comprehensive  and  liberal  views, 
who  understand  that  good  workmen  must  be  the  allies 
of  their  employers.  A  writer  from  that  part  of  the 
country  which  we  call  The  West — evidently  a  proprietor 


204  CALIFORNIA    ANTHOLOGY. 

and  influential  director  of  railroad  management,  sent  a 
letter  to  a  distinguished  journal,  setting  forth  in  a  clear 
and  forcible  way  that  owners,  directors  and  managers 
of  railroads  should  adopt  some  method  of  helping  their 
workmen,  outside  the  duties  for  which  they  are  paid,  in 
their  private  lives.  He  is  a  man  of  experience  and 
ability.  His  view  I  will  not  discuss;  it  is  the  spirit  of 
it  that  I  notice.  It  is  the  appearance  of  the  moral 
element  in  political  economy  which,  until  recently,  has 
been  altogether  ignored.  Such  movements  will  get 
into  form  after  a  while.  All  intelligent  and  thoughtful 
men  should  inform  themselves  on  these  things,  and 
know  what  is  being  done,  and  with  what  success.  It 
is,  according  to  my  way  of  thinking  and  feeling,  one  of 
the  most  interesting  and  important  subjects  that  our 
modern  society  presents.  If  intelligent  and  wise  men 
do  not  take  it  up,  passionate  and  ignorant  men  will. 
Men  who  can  only  feel  a  wrong  need  to  be  guided  by 
those  who  can  see  it.  If  there  is  anything  in  the 
future  that  seems  to  me  certain  in  the  unfolding  of 
principles,  it  is  that  labor  and  capital  can  never  settle 
down  on  the  old  bare  political-economy  proposition  of 
demand  and  supply.  The  matter  can  never  rest,  so  it 
seems  to  me,  save  on  terms  of  mutual  moral  support. 
In  the  mean  time,  the  man  who  talks  only  to  human 
passions,  who  talks  carelessly  about  the  rights  of  prop 
erty,  and  only  disturbs  men  where  they  are,  before  they 
can  do  better,  is  a  moral  incendiary,  and  deserves  con 
dign  punishment. — Rev.  Horatio  Stebbins. 


SOCIETY  AND  THE  STATE.  205 


THE  REARING  OF  CHILDREN. 

188.  THERE   CAN   be   no   doubt  that   the  gradual 
impairment  and  loss  of  parental  authority  and  influence 
is  one  of  the  most  serious  and  momentous  evils  which 
beset  the   American  civilization.       It   undermines  the 
very  foundations  of  the  family — the  essential  unit  of 
society. — Prof.   John  LeConte, 

189.  OUR  MORTUARY  reports  show  that  about  forty 
per  cent,  of  our  children  die  before  they  attain  their 
fifth  year.      If  stock-raisers  were  no  more  successful  in 
rearing  brutes  than  parents  are  in  raising  children,  they 
would  soon  become  bankrupt.     If  beautiful  and  healthy 
children  at  the  age  of  fifteen  years  should  command  a 
high  money  premium  from  society  or  the   State,  or  if 
families  rearing  children  without  loss,  and  at  the  same 
time  possessing  health  and  beauty,  should  be  entitled  to 
honors  and  pecuniary  rewards,  it  is  very  probable  that 
the    present    system    of   slaughtering   children    would 
not   long   continue.     A    money    consideration    would 
prompt  the  discovery  of  laws  and  lead  to  the  adoption 

)f  proper  food,  clothing,  exercise,  and  habits  favoring 
lealth,  development,  symmetry  of  form,  beauty  of  fea 
ture,  and  longevity.      Great   is   the   Almighty  Dollar! 

—Gen.  John  A.  Collins. 

190.  LET  NO  WOMAN  dare  invoke  an  immortal  life 
until  she  feels  herself  worthy  to  develop  it  and  lead  it 
forth  into  all  its  appointed  good.      Let  her  never  enter 


206  CALIFORNIA   ANTHOLOGY. 

that  "holy  of  holies" — the  confidence  of  the  young 
heart  that  has  been  nurtured  beneath  her  own — without 
trying  herself,  whether  she  be  worthy  of  that  high  pre 
rogative;  without  a  tender,  deep  and  prayerful  deter 
mination  to  make  this  one  duty  paramount  to  all  others, 
so  that  she  may  invest  maternity  with  that  divine  intelli 
gence  that  can  instruct,  with  that  beautiful  love  which 
can  feel  no  sacrifice,  with  that  sweet  forbearance  which 
knows  no  impatience,  with  that  sublime  devotion  which 
can  make  even  suffering  itself  a  joy. — Gen.  John  A. 
Collins. 

191.  THE  MINDS  of  children,  like  their  bodies,  can 
safely  bear  but  a  limited  amount  of  exercise.  During 
the  tender  years,  mental  as  well  as  physical  culture 
should  partake  more  of  the  character  of  amusement 
than  of  labor.  Physical  weakness,  retarded  and  stunted 
growth,  and  deformity,  are  common  among  the  factory 
children  of  Europe.  Nervous  irritability,  dyspepsia, 
stunted  and  imbecile  minds,  are  among  the  youth  of 
our  American  schools.  Men  whose  frames  have  attained 
their  natural  growth,  whose  bones  are  matured  and 
hardened,  complain,  protest,  and  rebel  against  ten  hours' 
daily  labor,  as  being  too  much  and  too  long  for  health 
ful  endurance ;  and  yet  we  confine  our  children  in 
schools  from  five  to  six  hours  daily,  and  then  many  of 
the  lessons  must  be  acquired  out  of  school.  This  is  an 
outrage  upon  our  youth,  and  downright  robbery  of  the 
coming  generations  of  their  rightful  physical  strength, 
and  mental  and  moral  powers.  No  pupil  under  four 
teen  should  be  allowed,  under  ordinary  circumstances, 


SOCIETY  AND  THE  STATE.  207 

to  take  home  a  book  from  the  school  room.  There 
are  always  a  gifted  few  who  possess  enormous  capacity 
for  endurance  and  study,  but  to  make  the  ability 
of  these  the  standard,  is  unwise  and  unjust.  Our 
youth  have  something  to  learn  besides  abstract  mental 
studies.  The  heart,  or  morals  and  manners,  as  well  as 
mind,  demand  culture,  expansion,  pruning  and  direction. 

—Gen.   John  A.   Collins. 

192.  PARENTS  COMMIT  a  sad  and  almost  remediless 
error  when  they  bring  up  their  children  in  bookless, 
pictureless  homes.  A  forlorn  looking  house,  with  dusty 
grain  fields  sweeping  to  the  very  door,  no  orchard  or 
garden,  no  picturesque  porches  or  balconies,  is  not  apt 
to  be  very  dear  to  the  memories  of  after  years.  It  does 
not  take  much  money  to  brighten  home,  but  it  does 
take  patience  and  forethought.  A  few  books  of  per 
manent  value — the  master-pieces  of  English  literature; 
a  few  engravings  of  pure  outline  and  refined  beauty, 
which  shall  daily  refine  the  children's  faces ;  a  few 
papers  of  good  morals  and  practical  ability;  a  bit  of 
color  here,  a  home-made  bracket  there,  an  air  of  neat 
ness  everywhere — are  these  costly  requirements  ?  In 
this  age  of  toil,  ambition,  and  wealth -getting,  we  can 
not  too  strongly  emphasize  the  fact  that  it  is  not  suffi 
cient  for  a  man  to  feed,  clothe,  and  technically  educate 
his  children.  He  must  forge  links  to  bind  their  hearts 
to  the  paternal  acres  and  to  the  family  calling :  gardens, 
shrubberies,  clinging  vines,  pictures,  low  voices  of  lov 
ing  parents — these  shall  far  out-bid  the  attractions  of 
saloons,  billiard  tables,  races,  and  licentiousness.  Your 

14 


208  CALIFORNIA   ANTHOLOGY. 

sons,  under  proper  home-influences,  shall  become  sinewy 
and  truth  loving,  your  daughters  fair  and  stately ;  their 
names  shall  be  unsullied,  and  their  lives  sweet  and 
rare. — diaries  H.  Shinn. 


FREEDOM. 

193.  Freedom  is,  and  ever  must  be  while  the  earth 
turns  round,  mankind's  inalienable  inheritance,  and 
manhood's  strength  and  pride  and  glory.  Her  snowy 
raiment  has  oft  been  stained  with  blood.  Her  mild, 
sweet  eyes  have  kindled  with  frenzy;  her  hymn  of  de- 
liverence  has  mingled  with  the  wild  scream  of 
plasphemy,  the  howl  of  livid  fury  and  infernal  hate, 
but  she  is  still  an  angel  of  more  than  mortal  light  and 
beauty  to  the  nations.  To  win  her  recognition  and  re 
ceive  her  benediction  humanity,  from  immemorial  ages; 
has  wandered  in  burning  sandy  deserts,  climbed  with 
bleeding  feet  the  rocky  gorge  and  flinty  mountain, 
endured  the  pangs  of  hunger  and  the  agonies  of  thirst, 
borne  the  blast  of  the  merciless  hurricane,  the  whirl 
wind  of  pitiless  fire.  Our  country  had  nobility  stamped 
upon  its  origin  !  It  sprang  into  luminous  being  from 
the  throes  of  a  bloody  revolution,  with  the  deathless, 
thrilling  word  of-  Freedom  blazoned  on  her  shining 
forehead — Freedom,  whose  every  look  was  wisdom, 
whose  every  word  was  love.  Won  by  ancestors,  whose 
thought  by  day  and  dream  by  night,  was  freedom , 
whose  only  august  alternative  was  death!  Our  country! 


SOCIETY    AND    THE    STATE.  209 

V  ' 

with  an  outlook  of  promise,  grander  than  which  never 
bewildered  the  eye  of  fancy ;  with  a  destiny  so  peerless 
that  the  reckless  enthusiast,  urged  he  never  so  wildly 
the  steeds  of  thought,  might  never  hope  to  reach  its 
ultimate  development  or  attain  its  final  grandeur,  when 
in  consummate  perfection  with  the  realization  of  all  its 
extrinsic  and  intrinsic  possibilities  it  shall  present  itself 
to  the  muse  of  history  as  the  grandest  government 
ever  witnessed  by  humanity,  the  strongest  and  happiest 
republic  built  by  man,  feared  by  tyrants,  and  blessed 
by  God. — Dr.  J.  Campbell  Shorb. 

194.  OFTEN  HAS  the  death  of  freedom  been  fore 
told,  and  her  grave  prepared.  Once  and  again  has 
despotism  sat  down,  amidst  the  pomp  and  glare  of  vic 
tory,  to  write  her  epitaph.  Prostrate  upon  the  bloody 
field,  her  foes  have  mistaken  her  trance  of  agony  for 
the  pangs  of  dissolution.  But  now  she  has  leaped  from 
the  dust,  called  her  warriors  to  battle,  bared  her  shining 
blade  to  the  foe,  and  shouting  at  the  head  of  her 
charging  columns,  she  has  converted  the  dark  hour  of 
her  fancied  extinction  into  the  dawn  of  an  immortal  day. 
Such  were  the  days  of  Marathon  and  Thermopylae;  and 
the  preservation  of  freedom  is  as  much  more  glorious 
now  than  then  as  American  liberty  in  the  nineteenth 
century  is  superior  to  the  tumultuous  democracy  of 
Athens,  or  the  cruel  and  gloomy  republicanism  of 
Rome.  No,  Freedom  cannot  die.  She  may  be  pros 
trated  upon  a  hundred  fields  of  blood,  but  she  will  rise 
crowned  with  light  and  radiant  with  immortality. 

— George  Barstow. 


210  CALIFORNIA    ANTHOLOGY. 

195.  LONG  YEARS  ago,  I  took  my  stand  by  Free 
dom,  and  where  in  youth  my  feet  were  planted,  there 
my  manhood  and  my  age  shall  march.     And,  for  one, 
I  am  not  ashamed  of  Freedom.      I   know  her  power; 
I  rejoice  in  her  majesty ;    I   walk  beneath  her  banner; 
I  glory  in  her  strength.      I   have  seen  her  again  and 
again  struck  down  on  a  hundred  chosen  fields  of  battle; 
I   have    seen     her   friends    fly     from    her ;      I     have 
seen    her    foes    gather   around    her;       I    have     seen 
them  bind  her  to  the  stake ;    I   have  seen  them  give 
her  ashes  to  the   winds,   regathering  them  that  they 
might  scatter  them  yet  more  widely;    but  when  they 
turned  to  exult,  I  have  seen  her  again  meet  them,  face 
to  face,  clad  in  complete  steel,  and  brandishing   in  her 
strong  right  hand  a  flaming  sword,  red  with  insuffera 
ble  light. — Gen.  E.  D.  Baker. 

196.  AGAIN,  forth  from  the  wrecks  of  empire,  amid 
tumbling  thrones  and  tottering  dynasties   (as  the  Ac 
anthus  bursts  in  bloom  and  beauty  from   the  ruins  of 
Egyptian  graves)    rises    man,    the  lord    vicarious     of 
earth,  proud  and  imposing  in  the  majesty  of  manhood. 
Again  Freedom  stalks  above  the  mountain  tops,  sing 
ing  her  song  of  triumph  and  brandishing  her  flaming 
spear.     So  strode  the  daughter  of  Jeptha,  as  she  ad 
vanced  unto  the  sacrifice;    so  sang  Deborah,  as    she 
chanted    the  conquests    of  her  people;    so  flamed  the 
sword  of  Judith,  red  with  the  blood  of  Holofernes. 

— Jos.  IV.  Winans. 

197.  THEY  WHO  look  upon   Liberty  as  having  ac 
complished  her  mission,  when  she  has  abolished  heredi- 


SOCIETY    AND    THE    STATE.  211 

tary  privileges  and  given  men  the  ballot,  who  think  of 
her  as  having  no  further  relations  to  the  every-day 
affairs  of  life,  have  not  seen  her  real  grandeur — to  them 
the  poets  who  have  sung  of  her  must  seem  rhapsodists, 
and  her  martyrs  fools !  As  the  sun  is  the  lord  of  life, 
as  well  as  of  light,  as  his  beams  not  merely  pierce  the 
clouds,  but  support  all  growth,  supply  all  motion,  and 
call  forth  from  what  would  otherwise  be  a  cold  and  inert 
mass,  all  the  infinite  diversities  of  being  and  beauty,  so 
is  liberty  to  mankind.  It  is  not  for  an  abstraction  that 
men  have  toiled  and  died;  that  in  every  age  the  wit 
nesses  of  liberty  have  stood  forth,  and  the  martyrs  of 
liberty  have  suffered.  It  was  for  more  than  this  that 
matrons  handed  the  Queen  Anne  musket  from  its  rest, 
and  that  maids  bid  their  lovers  go  to  death ! 

We  speak  of  liberty  as  one  thing,  and  of  virtue, 
wealth,  knowledge,  invention,  national  strength  and 
national  independence  as  other  things.  But,  of  all 
these,  Liberty  is  the  source,  the  mother,  the  necessary 
condition.  She  is  to  virtue  what  light  is  to  color,  to 
wealth  what  sunshine  is  to  grain,  to  knowledge  what 
eyes  are  to  the  sight.  She  is  the  genius  of  invention, 
the  brawn  of  national  strength,  the  spirit  of  national 
independence !  Where  Liberty  rises,  there  virtue 
grows,  wealth  increases,  knowledge  expands,  invention 
multiplies  human  powers,  and  in  strength  and  spirit  the 
freer  nation  rises  among  her  neighbors  as  Saul  amid  his 
brethren — taller  and  fairer.  Where  liberty  sinks,  there 
virtue  fades,  wealth  diminishes,  knowledge  is  forgotten, 
invention  ceases,  and  empires,  once  mighty  in  arms 


212  CALIFORNIA    ANTHOLOGY. 

1   and  arts,  become  a  helpless  prey  to  freer  barbarians. 

— Henry  George. 

198.  AMERICANS,  in  their  excusable  pride  and  en 
thusiasm,  are  often  prone  to  claim  for  themselves 
solely,  the  glory  of  having  first  enunciated,  in  distinct 
form,  those  grand  maxims  and  principles  which  consti 
tute  the  chief  corner-stone  of  our  temple  of  freedom. 
We  forget  that,  under  a  great  law  of  nature,  nothing 
seems  to  be  created  and  perfected  at  the  same  time. 
The  great  globe  on  which  we  stand — this  broad  and 
beautiful  earth — was,  in  the  beginning,  without  form, 
and  void.  After  it  took  up  its  grand  march,  to  the 
music  of  the  spheres,  around  the  blazing  pivotal  sun, 
thousands  and  thousands  of  ages  passed  away  before 
it  emerged  from  its  primeval  state  of  chaos,  and  gradu 
ally  became  prepared  for  the  purposes  designed  by  its 
great  Creator — crested  with  mountains,  silvered  with 
oceans,  shadowed  by  forests,  gilded  and  spangled  with 
flowers,  and  finally  consecrated  by  the  presence  of  God 
like  man. 

The  homely  fragment  of  carbon  lay,  rude  and  neg 
lected,  in  the  hidden  gorges  of  Golconda,  for  myriads 
of  centuries  before  the  magic  influences  of  time  endowed 
it  with  that  lustrous  radiance  which  adds  splendor  to 
the  most  gorgeous  diadem  of  royalty,  and  which  the 
brilliancy  of  Beauty's  eye  alone  exceeds. 

Countless  centuries  have  passed  away  since,  on  the 
sanded  floors  of  the  ocean,  were  laid  the  first  founda 
tions  of  those  coral-islands,  which  have  risen  proudly 


SOCIETY   AND    THE    STATE.  213 

above  the  dashing  wave,  and  gleam  in   their   velvet 
verdure,  like  stars  on  the  breast  of  the  sea. 

So,  in  like  manner,  we  are  to  look  far  beyond  the 
Fourth  day  of  July,  1776,  for  the  primitive  sources  of 
those  sacred  sentiments  and  principles  which,  like  mul 
titudinous  rivulets  gathering  from  far  distant  mountain 
peaks,  have  converged,  and  at  length  united  in  one 
noble,  generous,  broad-rushing  stream,  that  gives  life 
and  happiness  to  all  the  dwellers  in  the  land. 

From  Palestine,  from  Greece  and  from  Rome,  from 
Germany,  France  and  from  England,  have  descended 
to  us  through  centuries,  the  chief  axioms  of  liberty, 
and  many  of  the  weapons  of  its  defence.  Chiefly, 
however,  to  our  mother-land,  we  owe  a  debt  of  gratitude 
for  a  great  share  of  our  immunities  as  freemen ;  she 
gave  to  us  the  Magna  Charta,  the  right  of  trial  by  jury, 
the  writ  of  Habeas  Corpus,  and  the  guarantees  of  re 
ligious  liberty.  And  though  the  mother  and  daughter, 
subsequently  quarreling  about  matters  of  taxation  and 
representation,  dissolved  their  political  connections  and 
became  permanently  separated,  yet  no  candid  and  lib 
eral  mind  will  deny,  that  we  owe  a  very  large  share  of 
our  inestimable  civil  and  religious  privileges,  to  that 
sturdy  and  imperishable  love  of  freedom  and  hatred  of 
tyranny,  which  have  ever  been  a  marked  feature  of  the 
English  character,  and  which  have  descended  to  us  on 
the  western  shore  of  the  Atlantic. 

Jefferson,  in  writing  the  Declaration  of  Independence, 
drew  his  inspiration  from  these  various  sources;  the 
wise  and  patriotic  statesmen  who  assembled  to  frame 


214  CALIFORNIA    ANTHOLOGY. 

the  Constitution  of  the  United  States,  found  no  higher 
or  purer  springs  at  which  to  slake  their  quenchless 
thirst  for  freedom.  While  we  scan  the  luminous  records 
of  the  past,  and  glorify  the  names  of  the  fathers  of  the 
Republic,  let  us  not,  in  thoughtless  selfishness,  forget 
the  services  rendered  to  us,  in  common  with  the  rest  of 
mankind,  by  the  patriots,  soldiers  and  sages  of  genera 
tions  long  departed. 

The  Constitution  of  the  United  States  may  aptly  be 
compared  to  a  grand  and  mighty  temple,  built  of  the 
rarest  and  choicest  materials,  collected  and  preserved 
by  the  heroes  of  the  human  race  through  all  the  ages 
of  the  world's  history,  and  handed  down  to  our  fathers 
for  the  benefit  of  themselves  and  their  posterity  for 
ever.  While  we  praise  the  architects  who  composed 
the  edifice,  and  exhaust  panegyric  in  expressing  our 
admiration  of  their  skill  and  fidelity,  we  must  not  for 
get  the  long  train  of  immortal  co-laborers,  who,  from 
the  distant  realms  of  Time,  brought  column  and  archi 
trave,  cornice  and  spire  and  firm  foundation  stone,  to 
aid  us  in  the  erection  of  a  fabric  that  should  defy  the 
corroding  tooth  of  age,  the  earthquake  shock  of  civil 
commotion,  the  thunder  bolts  of  foreign  invasion,  the 
silent  but  fatal  influences  of  human  corruption  and 
degeneracy,  and  become  the  eternal  abiding-place  of 
the  spirit  of  liberty;  a  fabric  beneath  whose  broad  and 
hospitable  roof  all  the  warring  and  diverse  nations  of 
Europe  might  find  shelter  and  peace ;  amid  whose 
stately  corridors  and  spacious  aisles,  beneath  whose 
majestic  domes,  the  humblest  citizen  and  the  proudest 


SOCIETY    AND    THE    STATE.  215 

dignitary  should  find  their  legal  and  political  rights  held 
in  exact  equipoise. —  J^tdge  E.   C.    WinchelL 

199.  POPULAR  SOVEREIGNTY,  in  some  shape  or  other, 
lies  at  the  foundation  of  all  free  governments.  Whether 
a  constitution  is  written  or  traditional,  wherever  free 
government  obtains,  it  must  rest  upon  that  great  basis; 
that  must  be  the  bed-rock,  below  which  you  cannot  go. 
All  the  expressions  upon  that  subject  which  men  be 
lieve  in  and  love  in  any  country,  emanate  from  that 
point — the  right  of  self-government,  the  power  in  the 
people  to  regulate  and  control  their  own  domestic  af 
fairs,  limited  by  or  manifested  through  constitutional 
provisions  or  legislative  enactments — expressions  more 
or  less  deliberate  of  the  popular  will.  The  American 
people  have  shown  their  love  of  this  doctrine  from  the 
time  of  the  Revolution  down  to  this  day.  We  derived 
the  idea  from  the  land  far  across  the  waves,  and  from  the 
ages  in  which  such  men  as  Hampden  and  Russell  and 
Sydney,  the  patriots  and  warriors  and  martyrs  of  that 
faith,  struggled  for  it  on  the  field  of  battle,  pined  for  it 
in  the  dungeon,  or  bled  for  it  on  the  scaffold.  Are  you 
a  German?  Is  not  the  idea  of  universal  personal  inde 
pendence  a  favorite  of  yours?  Whether  ruled  by  a 
duke  or  a  monarch,  still  the  idea  of  personal  liberty  is 
dear  to  the  German  heart.  So  with  the  Frenchman. 
Whether  fighting  under  a  despot  in  Italy,  or  barricad 
ing  the  streets  of  Paris  during  a  revolution,  he  loves 
the  idea  of  personal  liberty,  and  it  is  equally  present  in 
his  heart.  So  with  the  Englishman.  Dear  to  him  are 
the  recollections  of  the  great  English  Revolution  of 


216  CALIFORNIA    ANTHOLOGY. 

1688.  Proudly  and  affectionately  he  recalls  the  time 
when  Cromwell  and  his  psalm-singing  Ironsides  ar 
rayed  themselves  against  the  hosts  of  a  treacherous 
sovereign,  and  dragged  him  ignominiously  to  the  block 
because  he  attacked  the  great  principles  of  popular 
rights  and  personal  liberty.  Who  ever  heard  of  any 
man  reciting  a  poem  to  slavery?  But  if  you  want  the 
noblest  and  most  inspiring  poems,  save  those  from 
heaven,  read  Milton,  read  Shelley,  read  Homer,  read 
Halleck,  read  Bryant,  above  all,  read  SHAKESPEARE. 
There  are  poets  who  sell  themselves  with  venal  spirit 
to  fatten  in  the  atmosphere  of  Courts;  but  even  they, 
seduced  by  the  pomp  and  brilliancy  of  fashion,  cannot 
break  into  praise  of  slavery.  They  may  praise  the 
despot  himself,  but  the  iniquity  of  slavish  servitude  they 
dare  not  crown  with  poetry.  The  hauteur  of  the  poet 
will  not  allow  it,  and  his  hand  trembles,  falters,  and  is 
palsied  ere  he  attempts  to  sweep  it  in  such  praise  across 
the  lyre  of  song.  But  when  you  talk  to  him  of  Free 
dom,  his  lip  quivers  with  inspiration,  his  heart  glows, 
and  his  numbers  break  out  as  the  stream  dashes  from 
the  mountain  top  to  seek  the  vale  below — bright,  clear, 
sparkling,  free.  And  are  you  ashamed  to  march  in 
that  procession?  Shall  reproach,  shall  malignant  slan 
der,  shall  base  misrepresentation  make  you  hesitate? 
For  me,  at  least,  no.  A  thousand  times,  no!  I  love 
freedom  better  than  slavery.  I  will  speak  her  words, 
I  will  listen  to  her  music,  I  will  acknowledge  her  im 
pulses,  I  will  stand  beneath  her  flag,  I  will  fight  in  her 
ranks,  and  when  I  do  so,  I  shall  find  myself  surrounded 
by  the  great,  the  wise,  the  good,  the  brave,  the  noble— 


SOCIETY  AND  THE  STATE.  217 

the  noble  of  every  land.  If  I  could  stand  for  a  mo 
ment  upon  one  of  our  high  mountain-tops,  far  above 
all  the  kingdoms  of  the  world,  and  see  coming  up,  one 
after  another,  the  bravest  and  the  wisest  of  the  ancient 
warriors,  and  statesmen  and  kings,  and  monarchs,  and 
priests,  and  be  permitted  to  ask  their  opinion  on  "this 
theme,  with  a  common  voice,  and  in  thundertones,  re 
verberating  through  all  lands  and  echoing  down  the 
ages,  they  would  cry,  "Liberty,  Freedom,  the  Univer 
sal  Brotherhood  of  Man."  I  join  in  that  shout;  L  swell 
that  anthem;  I  echo  that  cry  forever  and  forever. 

— Gen.  E.  D.  Baker. 


WAR. 

200.  War  never  brings  unmitigated  evil.     When 
a  nation  has  grown  puerile  in  the  lap  of  peace,  it  revivi 
fies  its  torpid  dust  and  rekindles  its  martial  fire  at  the 
bloody  shrine  of  war.      Even  degenerate  sons,  goaded 
by  shame  at  witnessing  the  degradation  of  their  coun 
try,  arouse  themselves  at  last  and  draw  the  swords  of 
their  fathers.      Bad  as  war  is,   there  is  one  thing  worse 
—it  is  that  depth  of  moral  degradation  which  a  nation 
reaches  when  it  considers  that  it  has  nothing  worth 
fighting  for. — George  Barstow. 

201.  WHAT  SHALL  be  said  of  those  conflicts  that 
shatter  empires— the  civil  contests  that  deluge  mighty 
States  with  blood  ?     Viewed  as   isolated  phenomena, 
they  appear  to  be  pure  scourges — the  incarnate  wrath 


218  CALIFORNIA    ANTHOLOGY. 

of  God,  smiting  sinful  man.  But  could  we  trace  events 
to  their  germinal  cause  and  ultimate  results,  might  we 
not  discover  that  wars  are  normal  forces  moving  along 
the  track  of  progress  ?  May  they  not  have  their  ap 
propriate  place  and  office  in  the  evolution  of  humanity, 
from  the  primitive  to  the  perfected  state  ?  May  they 
not  be  looked  upon  as  curative  rather  than  destructive 
agencies — Nature's  heroic  method  of  expelling  disorder 
from  the  social  system  ?  May  they  not  perform  the 
same  office  for  the  State  that  the  surgeon's  knife  per 
forms  for  the  individual  stricken  with  a  consuming 
ulcer  ?  The  knife  is  not  an  instrument  of  death,  but 
an  instrument  of  science;  it  is  guided,  not  by  a  cruel, 
but  a  merciful  hand.  Its  office  is  not  to  -kill,  but  to 
cure — not  to  destroy,  but  to  save.  The  blood  flows,  the 
frame  is  racked  by  torture,  but  the  patient  is  saved. 

—Samuel  Williams. 

2O2.  THE  GREAT  enemy  of  commerce,  and,  indeed, 
of  the  human  race,  is  War.  Sometimes  ennobling  to 
individuals  and  nations,  it  is  more  frequently  the  off 
spring  of  a  narrow  nationality  and  inveterate  prejudice. 
If  it  enlists  in  its  service  some  of  the  noblest  qualities 
of  the  human  heart,  it  too  often  perverts  them  to  the 
service  of  a  despot.  From  the  earliest  ages  a  chain  of 
mountains,  or  a  line  of  a  river,  made  men  strangers,  if 
not  enemies.  Whatever,  therefore,  opens  communica 
tion,  and  creates  interchange  of  ideas,  counteracts  the 
sanguinary  tendencies  of  mankind,  and  does  its  part  to 
"  beat  the  sword  into  the  plowshare." — Gen.  E.  D. 
Baker. 


SOCIETY  AND  THE  STATE.  219 

2O3.  IT  SEEMS  strange  that  in  the  economy  of 
Providence,  war  should  have  been  permitted — stranger 
yet  that  it  should  have  been  made  the  means  of  human 
progress.  But  He  who  ordained  that  physical  man 
hood  should  be  attained  by  hard  contact  with  external 
things — that  strength  of  character  must  come  by  strug 
gling  with  difficulties,  and  that  moral  excellence  must 
be  the  result  of  triumph  over  vice,  also  ordained  that 
nations  must  be  baptized  in  the  fires  of  war  before  they 
can  wear  the  crown  of  national  glory.  Wars  have 
their  hopes  and  their  gains,  their  debits  and  their 
credits.  The  losses  fall  heaviest  upon  the  immediate 
generations,  the  greatest  gains  belong  to  generations  to 
come — often  their  ever-increasing  heritage.  Instance 
the  American  Revolution.  Who  would  strike  its 
bloody,  glorious  chapters  from  history  now  ?  How 
infinitely  do  the  gains  preponderate  over  the  losses ! 
See  the  balance-sheet !  Debit,  eight  years  of  war, 
cruel,  merciless,  with  sufferings  and  hardships  unparal 
leled  ;  debit,  thousands  of  lives,  millions  of  dollars  in 
property;  debit,  homes  destroyed,  families  severed;  de 
bit,  the  cruelties  of  the  cow  boys,  the  murder  of  inno 
cents,  the  massacre  of  -WTyoming,  the.  treachery  of 
Arnold;  debit  a  land  steeped  to  the  lips  in  poverty. 
Credit,  American  Independence,  credit  the  Federal 
Union,  credit  the  Constitution ;  credit  a  material  ad 
vancement  unheard  of  before;  credit  the  inventions  in 
mechanics,  the  discoveries  in  science,  great  names  in 
literature;  credit  an  impulse  to  civil  liberty  throughout 
the  world ;  credit  the  idea  that  while  Emperors  and 
Kings  are  dividing  and  partitioning  Europe,  this  conti- 


220  CALIFORNIA    ANTHOLOGY. 

nent  shall  belong  to  the  people,  and  they  shall  possess 
it  forever.  Credit  WASHINGTON!  and  if  the  Revolution 
had  only  served  to  reveal  that  name  in  the  brightness 
of  its  glory — name  among  all  men  and  races  and  ages, 
most  loved,  most  honored,  most  revered — its  blood 
would  not  have  been  shed  in  vain.  There  is  nothing 
that  consumes,  wastes,  destroys,  like  an  army.  War  is 
a  great  maelstrom  that  draws  into  its  vortex  that  which 
is  near,  and  whose  eddies  and  currents  disturb  the 
waters  of  the  farthest  sea.  But  there  is  a  deeper,  ten 
derer,  sadder  loss,  that  figures  cannot  represent  or  im 
agination  conceive,  the  heart  can  only  bleed  over  it— 
the  loss  of  precious,  noble  lives.  And  such  lives — the 
brave,  the  daring,  the  manly,  the  self-sacrificing.  Nations 
mourn  the  fall  of  the  gifted,  and  history  enshrines  their 
names  in  their  annals;  but  the  humble,  the  lowly, 
though  brave  and  good,  have  fallen  by  tens  of  thous 
ands,  not  alone  on  the  field  of  battle  and  of  glory, 
where  there  are  shoutings  of  the  captains,  the  thunder 
of  artillery,  and  all  the  pomp  and  pride  of  war,  but  in 
the  sickly  camp,  the  crowded  hospital,  in  the  noisome 
prison — they  lie  in  indiscriminate  trenches  and  in  name 
less  graves,  where  not  even  the  tear  of  love  can  mark 
their  resting  place. — Newton  Booth. 


OUR  COUNTRY. 

2O4.  AMERICAN  PATRIOTISM. — We  walk  the  earth 
at  mid-day,  and  the  vast  expanse  of  the  blue  heavens 
appears  unrelieved  by  the  sparkle  of  a  single  star.  Our 


.  SOCIETY  AND  THE  STATE.  221 

world  seems  to  be  the  lonely  satrap  of  space,  chained 
to  the  fiery  chariot  of  the  mighty  sun.  And  yet  we 
know  that  Mars  still  holds  his  course;  that  Venus  still 
whirls  through  space;  that  Saturn  circles  amid  his  shin 
ing  rings;  that  Jupiter  and  Uranus  are  flashing  on  the 
confines  of  light;  that  the  blazing  belt  of  Orion  and 
the  guiding  gleam  of  the  North  Star  are  all  there;  and 
that  when  the  centrifugal  force  of  the  earth  shall  whirl 
us  again  into  the  presence  of  night,  we  shall  again  be 
hold  our  companion  worlds,  as  they  journey  in  shining 
splendor  upon  their  eternal  rounds.  So,  though  we 
may  not  always  be  able  to  see  the  patriotism,  the  honor 
and  the  free  spirit  of  the  American  people,  we  know 
they  exist,  and  that  when  the  hour  comes,  we  shall 
see  them  once  more  arrayed  in  majesty,  in  beauty  and 
in  power. — Thomas  Fitch. 

205.  GOVERNMENT. — As  yet  the  American  mind 
governs  the  American  continent,  and  its  most  powerful 
instinct  is  to  appeal  to  law  for  the  redress   of  private 
wrong,  and  to  the  ballot  for  the  reform  of  public  griev 
ances.    No  government  can  be  better  than  the  people, 
or,  for  any  long  period  of  time,  worse  than  the  people. 
The  world  is  governed    too  much  by  remote  and  cen 
tralized  power.      Minute  local  administration  is  always 
purest  and   wisest.      To  thoughtful  men  the   govern 
ments  of  the  world  seem  to  be  growing  better,  because 
they  govern  less. — Edward  C.  Marshall. 

206.  WHAT  is  OUR  COUNTRY? — It  is  not  the  land 
and  the  sea,  the  river  and  the   mountain,  the  people, 
their  history  and  laws.      It  is  something  more  than  all 


222  CALIFORNIA    ANTHOLOGY. 

these.  It  is  a  bright  ideal,  a  living  presence  in  the 
heart,  whose  destruction  would  rob  the  earth  of  beauty, 
the  stars  of  their  glory,  the  sun  of  its  brightness,  life  of 
its  sweetness,  love  of  its  joy.  My  countrymen!  cherish 
this  ideal.  It  will  exalt  you,  as  you  exalt  it.  Make  it 
your  cloud  by  day,  your  pillar  of  fire  by  night.  Follow 
where  it  leads.  Enlarge  your  horizon.  Take  counsel 
of  the  dead.  No  martyr  ever  died  in  the  conflict  of 
ideas,  which  is  one  of  the  conditions  of  human  pro 
gress,  but  pleads  for  the  cause  consecrated  by  his  blood. 
Strive  to  pierce  the  future.  Listen  to  the  footfall  of 
coming  generations.  No  child  to  be  born  on  earth 
but  has  an  interest  in  the  cause  of  liberty  and  equality. 
Rise  to  the  hight  of  a  great  occasion.  Hear  the  voice 
of  the  ages.  Take  your  reckoning  by  the  stars.  Then 
choose. — Newton  Booth. 

20 7.  You  MAY  SEARCH  through  the  volume  of  his 
tory,  you  may  study  closely,  and  analyze  the  charater- 
istics  of  nations   that  have  passed  away,  yet  of  none 
will  you  find  greater  attributes,  nobler  powers,  or  deep 
er  capacities  than  those  which  surround,  adorn  and  bless 
the  American  people.      Nowhere  else  was  there  such  a 
continent,    nowhere    else  such  an    empire.      Nowhere 
else  is  nature  so  bountiful,  holding  such  stores  of  agri 
cultural  and  mineral  resources.    Nowhere  else  has  there 
been  made  such  progress  in  the  sciences  and  in  all  that 
benefits  the  human  race. — Milton  S.  Latham. 

208.  THOUGH  NEITHER  a  zealot  nor  a  dreamer,  I 
have  an  abiding  faith  in   the   fortunes  of  my  country. 


SOCIETY    AND    THE    STATE.  223 

Could  I  stand  like  a  revelator,  and  gaze  upward  through 
the  grand  visions  of  the  political  Apocalypse;  could  I 
behold  the  opening  of  seal  upon  seal,  and  the  revelation 
of  glory  upon  glory,  disclosing  the  future  of  the  nations 
in  a  prospect  more  gorgeous  than  that  which  the 
tempter  spread  before  the  Son  of  Man,  I  would  ascribe 
all  the  splendor  of  the  scene  to  the  origin,  the  progress, 
the  grandeur  and  the  destiny  of  these  United  States. 

—Joseph  W.  Winans. 

2O9.  ONE  ESSENTIAL  TO  NATIONAL  LIFE. — It  will 
be  well  for  us  to  ask  ourselves  the  question,  and  answer 
it  honestly  and  frankly,  whether  our  unprecedented 
material  progress  has  not  in  a  great  measure  over 
shadowed  our  moral  and  intellectual  advancement — 
whether  the  sea  of  material  prosperity  in  which,  despite 
occasional  squalls,  we  continue  to  float  buoyantly  and 
hopefully,  does  not  threaten  completely  to  engulph  those 
moral  and  intellectual  qualities  without  which  a  nation 
cannot  long  sustain  its  position  and  independence.  We 
care  not  to  reply  to  these  interrogatories  ;  they  are 
fraught  with  painful  considerations.  But  we  will  sug 
gest  that  when  ingratitude  corrupts  the  moral  heart  of 
a  people,  patriotism  is  on  the  decline;  and  when  patri 
otism  ceases  to  exist,  dissension,  treachery,  and  ruin 
soon  follow.  The  name  of  Samuel  Adams  is  scarcely 
known  among  us  to-day,  and  the  memory  of  our  glori 
ous  Washington  seems  to  inspire  us  with  little  gratitude. 
It  will  be  well  for  reflective  people  to  ponder  on  these 
things. — T.  W.  Freelon. 

15 


224  CALIFORNIA    ANTHOLOGY. 

210.  "A  FAIR  VESTAL  THRONED  BY  THE  WEST." 
-The  sayings  of  the  wise  have  oftentimes  a  reach  be 
yond  their  common  meaning.  •  When  the  dying  W'eb- 
ster  exclaimed,   "  I  still  live,"  he  only  meant  to  indicate 
that  life  still  fluttered  in  his  veins;    but  the  words  had 
a  higher  force,  and  symbolized  the  immortality  of  his 
renown.     And    so,    when    Shakespeare  spoke    of   "A 
Fair  Vestal  Throned  by  the  West,"  he  simply  meant  to 
eulogize  Elizabeth,  the  queenly  ruler  of  earth's  proudest 
realm;    but    a    prophetic    meaning   gathered    in    those 
words,  which,  stretching  to  the  future,  heralded  another, 
mightier  than  Elizabeth,  even  t.he  Goddess  of  Liberty 
herself,  seated  on  a  continent  and  lifting  her  head  above 
the  stars,  and  before  whose  majesty  all  nations   were 
to  bow. — ^os.  W.  Winans. 

211.  PATRIOTIC  DEVOTION. — I  yield  to  no  man  in 
devotion  to  our  common  country.      I   love  the   North, 
because  the  blood  of  my  paternal  ancestors  watered  her 
soil,  and  beneath  her  green  sod  their  bones  now  moulder. 
I   love  her  for  the  good  and  great,  .the  mighty  dead, 
who  once  trod  her  ways.      I  love  her  for  the  good  and 
true  men  who  are  within  her  borders — those  men  of 
whom  it  has  been  well  said,  that  their  loins  are  strong 
enough  and  their  shoulders  broad  enough  to  bear  the 
load  of  principle ;   men  who   have   the  earnestness  to 
seek  the  right,   and  the  moral  Courage  to  follow  their 
convictions ;  attempting  to  direct,  and  not  drifting  with 
the  tide  of  public  sentiment ;   who,  despite  the  tiger 
stare  of  ignorance,   unmoved  by '  the  rending  roar  of 
the  lion  of  fanaticism,  heedless  of  the  hungry  howl  of 


SOCIETY   AND    THE    STATE.  225 

the  wolves  of  faction,  battle  not  for  Southern  rights, 
battle  not  for  Northern  rights,  but  battle  that  each  and 
all  may  have  their  share  of  the  universal  right  which  is 
broader  than  the  universe  and  deeper  than  the  sea.  I 
love  the  West,  because  it  is  the  land  of  my  adoption. 
I  love  her  because  amid  her  golden  hills  and  her  pacific 
shore  the  years  of  my  early  manhood  have  glided  into 
the  past.  I  love  her  because  those  flowers  of  friend 
ship  which  only  flourish  in  the  spring  and  summer  of 
life,  for  me  have  bloomed  and  blossomed  here.  I  love 
the  South  because  she  is  the  land  of  my  birth.  I  love 
her  responsive  to  a  sentiment  which  finds  echo  in  every 
true  bosom.  I  love  her  as  a  man  should  love  his 
mother. — R.  D.  *Crittenden. 

212.  COMMEMORATIVE  DAYS.  — It  is  a  great  thing  for 
a  nation  to  have  a  heroic  past.  There  is  hope  of  im 
becile  and  lawless  Greece,  so  long  as  the  names  of 
Salamis,  Thermopylae  and  Marathon  are  spoken  among 
her  mountains  and  by  the  sea.  The  golden  age  of  Rome 
has  Ipeen  a  perpetual  and  keen  reproach  to  the  degene 
rate  Italian  heart,  and  made  possible  a  united  Italy. 
The  Alpine  passes  are  kept  forever  against  the  foot  of 
tyranny  by  the  spirit  of  the  patriot  Tell;  and  all  the 
Scottish  hills  are  hallowed  by  the  memory  of  the  Bruce 
of  Bannockburn.  Indeed  such  names  and  such  memo 
ries  cease  to  be  national.  They  become  the  heritage 
of  humanity,  and  are  quickeners  to  brave  deeds  and 
illustrious  lives  among  all  peoples.  It  is  therefore  wise 
and  good  to  keep  alive  by  monument  and  festival,  and 
speech  and  song,  by  any  memorial  device,  those  pas- 


226  CALIFORNIA    ANTHOLOGY. 

sages  of  a  nation's  story  in  which  she  moves  and  acts 
in  the  highest  and  noblest  strain.  It  is  not  enough  to 
write  them  down  on  the  pages  of  their  annals,  for 
scholars  to  read  amid  the  quiet  of  their  books.  They 
should  be  rehearsed  before  popular  assemblies,  made 
visible  and  vocal  to  the  popular  eye  and  heart,  be  re-en 
acted  as  in  a  living  drama,  and  press  their  moulding  in 
fluence  upon  the  whole  current  life  of  the  people.  It 
is  especially  needful  for  us  in  this  land,  that  we  keep  com 
memorative  days,  for  we  are  on  such  a  swift  and  hurry 
ing  tide — we  drift  so  rapidly  on  to  the  new — fresh  issues 
are  continually  calling  to  us  out  of  the  future — we  rush 
forward  with  headlong  eagerness  to  seize  more  splendid 
prizes — we  have  no  time  to  look  back — we  cannot  call 
a  halt  in  our  career  to  estimate  the  cost  of  what  we 
have  gained,  and  pay  our  reverent  and  grateful  debt 
to  the  past. — Rev.  Dr.  A.  L.  Stone. 

213.  No  NORTH,  NO  SOUTH. — I  know  no  distinc 
tion  between  North  and  South,  in  the  just  and  legal 
enforcement  of  the  laws.  I  believe  in  the  Constitution 
of  the  United  States,  and  by  the  compact  which  our 
fathers  made  I  am  willing  to  stand  to  the  death.  With 
the  institutions  of  the  South  I  have  nothing  to  do  (A. 
D.  1 86 1 — EDITOR.)  They  are  local  in  their  character, 
and  there  let  them  remain.  But  I  was  reared  in  a  State 
which  was  consecrated  to  liberty  long  before  the  corner 
stone  of  the  Republic  was  laid;  whose  free  soil,  un 
polluted  by  a  bondsman's  tread,  nurtured  a  happy  and 
independent  people.  Then  be  not  surprised  if,  having 
been  reared  among  the  free,  I  feel  no  great  admiration 


SOCIETY  AND  THE  STATE.  227 

for  the  political  system  which  would  condemn  the 
meanest  of  God's  creatures  to  hopeless  and  endless 
captivity.  If  God  in  his  wisdom  has  doomed  this 
nation  to  destruction — if  her  mission  is  fulfilled  and 
her  glory  is  to  pass  away — let  the  throes  of  her  disso 
lution  resemble  the  agony  of  her  birth,  and  as  she  was 
born,  so  let  her  expire:  amidst  the  shock  of  conflicting 
armies,  the  roar  of  battle,  the  thunder  of  cannon,  and 
the  groans  of  the  dying.  Let  her  live  no  longer,  a  cheat 
and  a  lie,  to  deceive  mankind  with  false  beacons  of 
freedom.  Let  her  punishment  be  an  example  so  terri 
ble  that  posterity,  for  a  thousand  years  to  come,  shall 
tremble  at  the  story  of  her  ruin.  If  man  cannot  ap 
preciate  the  blessings  of  freedom  and  learn  the  secret 
of  governing  himself,  let  her  name  be  blotted  out  from 
the  nations  of  the  earth,  and  the  smoke  of  her  expiring 
fires  darken  the  broad  heavens  like  the  folds  of  a  fun 
eral  pall.  But  this  extremity  has  not  yet  come.  High 
above  the  dark  clouds  of  war  I  see  the  sweet  vistas  of 
peace — peace  purchased,  perhaps,  on  the  blood-stained 
battle-field,  but  which  will  endure  when  the  conflict  is 
past,  and  the  cries  of  the  combatants  are  hushed  in  the 
stillness  of  death. — J.  H.  Warwick. 

"  214.  A  PERMANENT  UNION. — When  we  think  what 
men  builded  these  structures  (the  several  States  of  the 
Union);  when  we  think  what  principles  cement  them; 
when  we  think  what  blood  bought  and  protected  them, 
we  feel  that  there  is  but  one  power  on  this  earth  that 
can  dissolve  the  American  Union.  And  what  is  that 
power?  It  is  the  will  of  the  whole  American  people. 


228  CALIFORNIA   ANTHOLOGY. 

Until  that  mighty  fiat  goes  forth  the  Union  will  never 
be  dissolved,  unless  this  great  globe  itself  and  all  upon 
it  shall  also  be  dissolved.  Those  living  forms  of  our 
liberties,  the  American  Union  and  American  Constitu 
tion,  will  not  perish  from  the  earth.  Spirits  that  live 
throughout,  vital  in  every  part,  cannot  but  by  annihila 
tion  die.  Our  flag  is  the  flower  of  our  nationality- 
there  is  not  a  thread  in  it  which  has  not  been  bought 
and  drenched  by  the  blood  of  the  first  races  of  the 
world.  To  the  millions  of  the  Old  World,  in  their 
deepest  gloom,  it  gleams  in  the  Western  sky  like  a  star 
of  hope.  The  exile  from  the  banks  of  the  Rhine,  from 
the  sunny  Garonne,  and  from  the  broad  Shannon,  sits 
down  under  its  ample  folds  for  protection,  and  perchance 
hoists  beneath  it  the  trampled  emblem  of  his  own 
nationality,  and  looks  upon  it  with  joy  and  pride.  It 
is  the  sign,  the  seal,  the  symbol,  the  pledge,  the  bond 
of  our  nationality.  May  that  flag  and  nationality  be 
eternal.  Wre  Californians  are  in  a  land  of  which  Allen 
and  Putnam  never  heard,  and  over  which  the  wildest 
visionaries  of  those  early  days  never  dreamed  that 
our  eagles  would  soar,  but  though  remote  we  are  not 
indifferent.  I  am  an  American  citizen.  The  first  lesson 
which  my  dawning  reason  learned  from  the  lips  of  a 
patriot  father,  was  that  there  was  no  title  which  any 
rank  or  order,  or  class,  in  any  country,  could  give  me, 
prouder  than  that  of  an  American  Citizen.  The  enthu 
siasm  of  my  youth,  and  the  judgment  and  experience 
of  my  manhood,  have  confirmed  that  truth,  and  I  will 
never  surrender  that  proud  title  that  I  may  decline 
upon  any  paltry  provincial  appellation.— Eugene  Casserly. 


SOCIETY  AND  THE  STATE.  229 

215.  RECUPERATIVE  POWER  OF  THE  NATION. — The 
mission  of  the  Pioneer  has  well  nigh  ended.  He  has 
nowhere  to  retreat  beyond  the  companionship  'of  his 
fellows  or  the  far  stretching  antennse  of  a  zeal  which 
reaches  him,  and  holds  him,  and  civilizes  him,  whether 
he  will  or  no.  He  has  no  more  solitudes  to  conquer. 
Faster  and  faster  upon  his  retiring  footsteps  the  massed 
columns  of  enterprise  and  capital  have  advanced,  and 
made  his  most  secret  haunts  their  abiding  place.  The 
deserts  no  longer  protect  him;  the  mountains  give  him 
no  shelter.  The  vast  plains  that  since  primeval  hours 
had  borne  little  more  than  impressions  of  sweeping 
clouds,  that  shut  out  the  sunshine  from  their  mighty 
desolation,  have  trembled  and  been  burdened  with  the 
hurrying  vanguard  of  the  commerce  of  Occident  and 
'Orient;  and  the  White  Death  that  sat  upon  the  brow 
of  the  Sierras  has  been  transmuted  into  glowing  life  by 
the  irresistible  touch  of  the  gods  of  steam  and  electri 
city.  Far  to  the  north,  peaceful  acquisitions  of  territory 
have  increased  the  nation's  three  millions  of  square 
miles  to  hundreds  of  thousands  more.  Thirty  millions 
of  people  have  increased  to  more  than  forty  millions; 
and  the  sun,  as  he  throws  his  benignant  smiles  from 
ocean  to  ocean,  from  the  poles  to  the  tropic  savannahs, 
does  not  behold  the  unrewarded  toil  of  a  single  slave, 
or  see  the  face  of  one  not  rich  in  hope.  Upon  the 
surface  of  this  momentous  progression,  the  Nation  has 
endured  and  triumphed  over  the  scourge  of  civil  war. 
Cities  have  been  burned  to  ashes.  Almost  whole  States 
have  been  devastated,  and  apparently  left  to  the  hor 
rors  of  a  lingering  decay ;  and  all  industries  and  arts 


230  CALIFORNIA    ANTHOLOGY. 

i 

of  peace  have  seemed  at  times  unsettled  and  paralyzed 
by  the  anxieties  and  uncertainties  of  the  most  terrible 
of  intestine  dissensions.  Even  when  the  last  battle 
had  been  fought  and  the  last  physical  wound  inflicted, 
it  seemed  as  if  generations  must  be  born  and  buried 
before  the  nation's  wounds  would  heal,  and  that  it  must 
always  bear  unsightly  scars.  Yet  the  impetus  of  pro 
gress  has  been  so  universal  and  powerful,  that  no  evils, 
real  or  anticipated,  have  materially  checked  the  national 
growth.  It  hardly  feels  the  five  years  of  civil  war. 
Our  personal  recollections  almost  fail  to  preserve  a 
memory  of  its  awful  experiences.  The  occasional 
crippled  veteran  who  solicits  charity  in  the  streets,  or 
struggles  bravely  with  a  mutilated  body  to  gain  his 
poor  livelihood ;  or  the  social  sympathies  aroused  by 
the  sight  of  some  widowed  woman,  or  fatherless  child* 
are  almost  our  only  reminders  of  the  bloodiest  and 
most  desperate  conflict  the  historian  has  ever  had,  or 
I  believe  ever  will  have,  presented  to  his  pen.  The 
very  States  most  harassed  by  the  visible  presence  of 
war,  still  more  embarrassed  by  the  unsolved  problem  of 
free  labor  imposed  upon  a  servile  race,  and  the  almost 
total  destruction  of  commercial  values,  and,  most  of 
all,  cursed  in  the  effort  to  recuperate  by  a  devouring 
and  insatiable  breed  of  political  locusts — now  yearly  add 
to  the  nation's  wealth  more  than  they  ever  contributed 
in  any  one  year  of  their  former  prosperity,  and  are 
solvent  and  financially  secure.  I  am  proud  to  recognize 
this  fact,  so  much  more  calculated  to  exalt  the  prestige 
of  the  Southern  name  than  the  fearful  prodigality  with 
which  it  sacrificed  millions  of  treasure  and  hecatombs 


SOCIETY    AND    THE    STATE.  231 

of  valuable  lives  in  vindication  of  political  ideas  whose 
realization  would  have  been  their  and  our  national 
extinction.  The  moral  triumphs  of  the  South  have 
been  greater  and  grander  than  any  she  could  have  won 
by  prevailing  over  the  national  government.  She  has 
conquered  herself;  encountered  and  mastered  the  most 
serious  social  question  of  the  century;  and  is  success 
fully  moulding  her  opinions  and  shaping  her  destinies  to 
meet  the  requirements  of  the  great  future  in  store  for  her. 
Whatever  politicians  may  say — however  the  pressure 
of  partisan  necessity  may  seek  to  foster  a  spirit  of  dis 
trust  in  the  general  political  temper  of  the  South,  the 
people  firmly  believe  that  with  the  extinctiion  of  the 
causes  of  sectional  dissension,  with  the  abandonment 
of  human  slavery,  and  with  the  costly  but  not  too  dear 
results  of  the  contest  waged  over  the  pestilential  dogma 
of  secession,  there  is  securely  established  between 
North  and  Southland  for  the  first  time  since  the  Con 
vention  of  1787,  there  exists  that  more  perfect  Union, 
which  the  Constitution,  then  adopted,  sought  to  create. 
The  chief  dangers  have  passed  away  forever,  and  the 
evils  which  remain  to  be  overcome  are  results,  not 
causes;  they  diminish  of  themselves,  day  by  day  ;  as 
after  some  mid-night  tempest,  the  perturbed  waves  still 
rebellingly  upheave  the  ocean's  dark,  unfathomable 
depths,  but  with  an  ever  decreasing  strength,  and  at 
last,  their  foamy  crests  no  longer  lifted,  the  horizon  falls 
upon  a  high  expanse,  and  the  day  dawns  upon  a  limit 
less  and  golden  peace. — Gen  I  W.  H.  L.  Barnes. 

216.     THE  PERFECTION  OF  HUMAN  WISDOM. — Of 
this  let  the  world  be   assured — that    the    project    of 


232  CALIFORNIA   ANTHOLOGY. 

American  liberty  was  a  bold  one,  conceived  by  gallant 
spirits,  won  by  the  stern  determination  of  a  band  of 
heroes,  the  beneficial  results  of  which  can  be  meas 
ured  by  no  standpoint  of  human  conception.  And  let 
the  world  understand  this  other  fact — that  it  has  cost 
too  much  of  blood  and  treasure  to  be  lightly  sacrificed. 
Its  accomplishment  was  the  result  of  superhuman  ex 
ertion.  For  it,  martyrs  laid  clown  their  lives,  and  pat 
riots  gave  themselves  willing  sacrifices.  The  blood  of 
these  martyrs  is  the  seed  of  the  church  of  universal 
liberty.  Its  accomplishment  became  a  new  fact  in  the 
history  of  empires,  a  new  era  in  the  history  of  the 
world.  Civilization  beheld  the  dawn  of  a  newer  and 
brighter  day.  Barbarism  became  involved  in  a  darker 
and  drearier  night.  Religion  caught  the  mellow  lustre 
of  its  reflected  beauty.  Science  saw.  new  revelations 
in  its  clearer  light.  Literature  turned  a  new  and  a 
more  glowing  page.  Poetry  took  a  loftier  flight.  In 
dustry  became  the  handmaid  of  genius,  and,  bound  in 
the  golden  chains  of  honored  labor,  the  son  of  toil  first 
took  his  true  rank  in  the  family  of  man.  Roman  and 
Grecian  liberty  was  the  sport  and  plaything  of  a  refined 
and  Utopian  philosophy,  the  experiment  of  a  highly  cul 
tivated  age.  It  was  the  growth  of  a  sun-shiny  morn 
ing  in  the  world's  history.  It  flourished  while  the  dews 
of  philosophy  watered  it,  but  when  the  storms  of  a 
sterner  era,  the  tempest  of  internal  faction,  and  the 
winds  of  foreign  invasion  beat  upon  it,  it  fell.  American 
liberty  was  a  real,  practical  and  substantial  achievement; 
its  foundations  were  laid  in  the  recognition  of  the  abso 
lute  right  of  all  men  to  be  regarded  as  equal — of  the  prin- 


SOCIETY  AND  THE  STATE.  233 

ciple  that  the  government  was  founded  for  the  benefit  of 
all;  that  a  majority  of  the  people  should,  by  a  simple 
expression  of  their  will  through  the  ballot  box,  in  the 
choice  of  law-makers  and  rulers,  govern  themselves.  It 
was  a  wise  scheme  of  government  that  our  fathers  con 
ceived,  because  it  was  simple;  it  was  a  firm  govern 
ment,  because  it  was  planted  in  the  rights  and  interests 
of  all;  it  is  destined  to  immortal  perpetuity,  because  it 
is  the  perfection  of  human  wisdom;  it  cannot  fail,  be 
cause  it  is  for  the  interest  of  the  American  people  to 
sustain  it. — F.  M.  Pixley. 

217.  THE  AMERICAN  REVOLUTION. — The  sangui 
nary  record  of  the  Revolution  is  engraved  on  every  pat 
riot  heart.  From  her  crumbling  thrones  and  tottering 
dynasties  Europe  had  gazed  aghast  upon  the  spectacle 
of  that  young  and  giant  race  who,  far  away  upon 
another  hemisphere,  strangled  the  serpent  in  the  cradle, 
and  burst  the  bonds  of  tyranny;  who  grew  invincible 
amid  the  power,  and  radiant  amid  the  luster  of  free  in 
stitutions;  who  gave  new  impulses  to  science  and  the 
arts;  and  in  their  grand  ambition  had  resolved  to  de 
monstrate  the  freedom,  the  intelligence  and  the  equality 
of  universal  man.  The  contest  which  ensued  was  not 
a  mere  warfare  of  opinion,  not  a  simple  struggle  for 
supremacy,  not  alone  a  craving  thirst  for  conquest,  but 
that  inevitable  strife  which  from  the  beginning  had  been 
fore-ordained  between  the  independence  of  the  people 
and  the  despotism  of  their  rulers.  In  the  sublime  yet 
inscrutable  design  of  the  Omnipotent  it  was  ordained 
that  our  era  should  be  the  time,  our  continent  the  thea- 


234  CALIFORNIA    ANTHOLOGY. 

ter,  our  people  the  instrument  of  working  out  this 
mighty  problem.  And  so  the  fathers  trod  the  gory 
path,  and  bore  the  fierce  ordeal,  not  for  themselves 
alone,  not  alone  for  us,  not  for  the  glory  of  our  country 
only,  and  the  splendor  of  its  unimaginable  future,  but 
that  the  scepter  might  be  broken  and  the  miter  crushed; 
that  the  exactions  of  tyranny  and  the  spirit  of  intoler 
ance  might  be  resisted,  until  at  last,  in  the  long  lapse  of 
time  and  the  grand  sweep  of  revolution,  the  myriads  of 
earth's  benighted  men,  of  every  lineage  and  race  and 
creed  and  clime,  should  emerge  from  the  gloom  of  ages 
into  the  lambent  light  of  civil  and  religious  liberty. 
Well  may  we  too  rejoice,  as  our  fathers  did,  and  glory 
in  that  -day  which  gave  these  priceless  blessings  to  man 
kind. 

The  events  which  followed  are  like  the  marvels  of  a 
dream.     Vast  in  increase,  peerles.s  in  power,  and  lust 
rous  with  intelligence,  the  land  grew  glorious  among 
the  nations.      Hither  came  genius,  which  no  more  could 
kennel  with  the  royal  hounds.     Hither  invention,  which  ; 
grew  chill  beneath   the  throne;    hither   came    all    the; 
energies  of  mind  and  thought,  to  radiate  in  the  free  air;, 
hither  came  enterprise  and  talent,  which  had  failed  to 
thrive  on  the  caprice  of  patronage.     Up  rose  a  stalwart 
race,  the   true   nobility  of  nature.      Up  sprung  an   ei 
more  splendid  than  the  age  Augustan,  more  enlightenec 
than  the  age  of  Pericles.      Labor,  by  its  right  divine, 
became    King.      On   white-winged    navies   Commerce 
swept  the  sea.     Through  every   people  and   to   ever 
land,  the  prowess  of  our  arms  and  the  radiance  of  oul 
institutions  sped,  diffusing  universal  influence  and  light 


SOCIETY  AND  THE  STATE.  235 

The  sword  rested  in  its  scabbard,  and  the  arts  and 
sciences  usurped  the  lurid  throne  of  war. — Joseph  W. 
Winans. 

218.     THE  SUREST  GUARANTY  OF  OUR  PERPETUITY. 

—  Intelligence  alone,  however  general,  will  not  suffice 
to  preserve  our  republican  institutions.  The  love  of 
morality  and  virtue,  and  an  abiding  respect  for  the 
ennobling  principles  inculcated  by  the  precepts  of 
Christianity,  must  be  firmly  rooted  in  the  hearts  of  the 
people.  The  surest  guaranty  of  the  perpetuity  of  the 
American  plan  of  self-government,  lies  in  the  incor 
ruptible  character  of  the  mass  of  the  citizens  of  this 
Republic.  Exceptions  to  the  general  rule  of  integrity 
can  be  found  in  every  community ;  but  these  do  not 
affect  its  substantial  accuracy,  for  the  great  majority  of 
American  citizens,  north,  south,  east  and  west,  are,  as 
yet,  governed  in  their  private  lives,  and  in  their  political 
actions,  by  their  honest  convictions  of  what  is  just, 
right,  equitable,  and  conducive  to  the  common  wel 
fare;  and  thereby  indicate  a  recognition  of  their  moral 
accountability,  to  an  Unseen  and  Overruling  power. 
So  long  as  these  sentiments  hold  dominion  in  the  hearts 

)f  our  countrymen,  our  free  institutions  must  exist  in 
all  their  pristine  purity  and  vigor.  Corrupt,  base  and 
designing  men  will  attain  official  station,  but  the  nox 
ious  influences  which  exhale  from  their  moral  rottenness, 
will  be  neutralized  by  the  active  and  imperishable  prin 
ciples  of  virtue  and  truth,  incarnate  in  the  forms  of 
honest,  faithful  and  capable  men,  who  are  their  col 
leagues  in  duty.  Even  if  it  should  happen,  through 


23G  CALIFORNIA    ANTHOLOGY. 

any  inexplicable  combination  of  circumstances,  that  the 
most,  or  all  of  the  important  official  positions  in  the 
State  and  Nation,  should  be  held  by  daring  and  unscru 
pulous  incumbents,  defiant  of  God,  and  regardless  of 
their  fellow-men,  the  unshaken  integrity  and  incorrupti 
bility  of  the  people  would  eventually  thwart  the  lawless 
machinations  of  their  unworthy  rulers,  and  bring  their 
crafty  designs  of  personal  aggrandizement,  and  public 
ruin,  to  a  sure  and  ignominious  end. 

If,  on  the  other  hand,  a  long  and  prosperous  career, 
filling  the  land  with  wealth,  luxury,  ease,  idleness,  and 
vice,  shall  at  last,  slowly  and  inevitably,  like  a  relentless 
cancer,  eat  out  the  vital  virtues  of  the  people,  consuming 
their  probity,  integrity,  honor  and  truth,  destroying 
their  love  for,  and  pride  in,  their  free  institutions,  and 
rendering  them  indifferent  to  all  save  their  private 
schemes  of  selfish  exaltation  and  criminal  indulgence, 
the  downfall  of  our  republican  fabric  will  speedily  and 
certainly  ensue.  Rulers  will  grasp  the  reins  of  power, 
who  excel  in  flattery,  mendacity,  dishonesty,  and  wicked 
ambition.  Unrestrained  by  any  inward  monitor,  unawed 
by  any  fear  of  future  retribution,  unchecked  by  any 
protest  from  their  negligent  and  deluded  constituents, 
the  constitutional  bulwarks  which  confine  their  insatiable 
rapacity  will  be,  stone  by  stone,  turret  by  turret,  bastion 
by  bastion,  easily  broken  down  and  trampled  in  the 
dust,  and  nothing  will  remain  to  shield  those  God- 
given  rights,  the  lives,  liberties  and  happiness  of  the 
people  from  capricious,  cruel,  iron  despotism. 

— E.   C.  Winchell. 


SOCIETY    AND'  THE    STATE.  237 

219.  THE  FOUNDERS  OF  OUR  GOVERNMENT. — The 
science  of  government  is  the  grandest,  most  imposing, 
and  most  profound  that  ever  employed  the  genius  of 
the  statesman,  the  speculations  of  the  philosopher,  or 
the  wisdom  of  the  sage.  Within  its  giant  grasp  are 
held  the  destinies  of  nations  and  the  welfare  of  the  race. 
Constituted  as  man  is,  and  was  from  the  beginning,  a 
social  being,  incapable  of  self-direction,  or  even  of 
sustaining  his  existence  in  isolation  from  his  kind,  it 
became  no  less  essential  to  his  safety  than  indispensable 
to  his  happiness  that  he  should  mingle  in  social  com 
munion  with  his  fellow-men.  For  this,  concessions  must 
be  made  so  far  as  needful,  absolute  rights  renounced  so 
far  as  inconsistent  with  the  common  good.  For  this 
the  license  of  a  state  of  nature  must  give  place  to  trie 
sanctions  of  social  harmony  and  order.  For  this  a 
systematic  rule  of  action,  now  denominated  law,  must 
be  established,  and  relative  degrees  of  subordination 
and  authority  must  be  created  and  enforced.  First  in 
order  came  the  formation  of  families,  clans,  and  tribes, 
and  as  these  multiplied  into  nations,  they  resolved 
themselves  into  such  forms  of  municipal  combination 
as  accident  or  choice,  or  the  compulsion  of  their  leaders 
might  prescribe.  Hence  sprang  the  organization  of 
States,  Kingdoms  and  Empires,  with  their  different 
systems  of  polity,  authority  and  law.  The  compara 
tive  merits  of  these  systems,  and  their  imperfections, 
have  been  thoroughly  investigated.  From  the  earliest 
periods  of  history  it  has  been  the  highest  aim  of  human 
intellect  to  devise  a  perfect  form  of  government,  such 
as  would  best  secure  to  the  people  the  largest  degree 


238  CALIFORNIA    ANTHOLOGY. 

of  natural  rights  consistent  with  the  general  welfare, 
which,  while  it  advanced  the  true  interests  of  the 
commonwealth,  would  equally  promote  the  happiness 
and  protect  the  liberty  of  the  citizen  or  subject.  For 
this  Aristotle  theorized  and  Plato  mused — for  this 
Cicero  pondered  and  More  dreamed.  Yet  the  Politica 
were  but  the  comparison  of  existing  constitutions  with 
an  abstract  possibility,  the  Republics  of  Plato  and 
Cicero  were  perfectly  ideal,  and  the  Utopia,  in  its 
fanciful  extravagance,  surpassed  the  creations  of  ro 
mantic  fiction.  These  schemes  were  vague  and  vision 
ary  all — abstractions — rich  in  quaint  conceits  and 
philosophy,  reared  on  a  glowing  but  impracticable  model. 
They  conjure  up  a  government  surrounded  with  illusory 
magnificence,  exhibiting  an  oriental  splendor,  and  a 
mathematical  precision,  but  needing  one  thing  to 
complete  it,  that  it  should  be  formed  of  perfect  men.  But 
while  the  science  of  government  has  been  rendered 
thus  successful  in  theory  by  the  speculations  of  philoso 
phers,  very  different  results  have  attended  its  practical 
development.  For  thousands  of  years  the  various 
communities  of  earth  have  struggled  on  through  tur 
bulence,  vicissitude  and  change,  now  crushed  by  the 
tyranny  of  despots,  now  frantic  with  the  license  of  the 
multitude,  vexed  with  continuous  collisions  between  the 
rulers  and  the  ruled,  wading  oftentimes  through 
slaughter  to  the  triumphs  of  ambition  or  the  overthrow 
of  the  oppressor,  and  merging  into  barbarism  at  the 
last,  or  lapsing  into  utter  ruin  and  distinction.  And 
thus,  while  every  form  of  government  has  essayed  and 
tested  by  severe  experiment,  from  the  extreme  of  Ab 


SOCIETY  AND  THE  STATE.  239 

solutism  to  the  dead  level  of  a  pure  Democracy;  none 
of  these  forms,  save  ours,  has  borne  that  test  unscathed, 
or  escaped  universal  wreck.  The  giant  spirits  that 
laid  the  foundations  of  our  government,  approved  them 
selves  no  less  sagacious  in  the  cabinet  than  invincible 
in  the  field.  They  were  bold  and  original  in  thought 
as  in  action.  They  repudiated  all  existing  systems. 
They  derived  little  aid  from  the  schemes  of  philoso 
phers,  old  or  modern.  They  established  Republican 
ism,  but  not  the  Republicanism  of  any  former  era. 
They  realized  that  philosophy  must  be  the  corner-stone 
of  every  good  government,  but  yet  that  the  govern 
ment  itself  must  be  practically  adapted  to  the  nature  of 
man,  alike  capable  of  sustaining  his  personal  rights  and 
advancing  his  social  interests.  Adaptation  and  devel 
opment  are  the  characteristic  and  controlling  features  of 
the  noble  product  of  their  genius. — Jos.  W.  Winans. 

22O.  "ONE  AND  INSEPARABLE." — As  I  take  my  leave 
of  a  subject  upon  which  I  have  detained  you  too  long 
(speech  on  State  of  the  Country,  in  U.  S.  Senate,  Jan. 
3,  I86i — EDITOR)  I  think  in  my  mind  whether  I  shall 
add  anything,  in  my  feeble  way,  to  the  hopes,  the 
prayers,  the  aspirations  that  are  going  forth  daily  for  the 
perpetuity  of  the  Union  of  these  States.  I  ask  myself 
shall  I  add  anything  to  that  volume  of  invocation 
which  is  everywhere  rising  up  to  high  heaven,  "  Spare 
us  from  the  madness  of  disunion  and  civil  war!"  Stand 
ing  in  this  chamber  and  speaking  upon  this  subject,  I 
cannot  forget  that  I  am  standing  in  a  place  once  occu- 
pied  by  one  far,  far  mightier  than  I,  the  lachet  of  whose 
16 


240  CALIFORNIA   ANTHOLOGY. 

shoe  I  am  unworthy  to  unloose.  It  was  upon  this 
subject  of  secession,  of  disunion,  of  discord,  of  civil 
war,  that  Webster  uttered  those  immortal  sentiments, 
clothed  in  immortal  words,  married  to  the  noblest 
expressions  that  ever  fell  from  human  lips,  which  alone 
would  have  made  him  memorable  and  remembered 
forever.  I  cannot  improve  upon  those  expressions. 
They  were  uttered  nearly  thirty  years  ago,  in  the  face 
of  what  was  imagined  to  be  a  great  danger,  then  hap 
pily  dissipated.  They  were  uttered  in  the  fullness  of 
his  genius,  from  the  fullness  of  his  heart.  They  have 
echoed  since  in  millions  of  homes  and  in  foreign  lands. 
They  have  been  a  text-book  in  schools.  They  have 
been  an  inspiration  to  public  hope  and  to  public  liberty. 
As  I  close,  I  repeat  them,  I  adopt  them.  If  in  their 
presence  I  were  to  attempt  to  give  utterance  to  any 
words  of  my  own,  I  should  feel  that  I  ought  to  say, 

"And  shall  the  lyre,  so  long  divine, 
Degenerate  into  hands  like  mine  ? " 

I  adopt  the  closing  passages  of  that  immortal  speech; 
they  are  my  sentiments ;  they  are  the  sentiments  of 
every  man  upon  this  side  of  the  chamber.  I  would 
fain  believe  they  are  the  sentiments  of  every  man  upon 
this  floor.  I  would  fain  believe  that  they  are  an  inspi 
ration,  and  will  become  a  power  throughout  the  length 
and  breadth  of  this  broad  confederacy;  that  again  the 
aspirations  and  hopes  and  prayers  for  the  Union,  may 
rise  like  a  perpetual  hymn  of  hope  and  praise.  But, 
however,  this  may  be,  these  thoughts  are  mine;  and  as, 
reverently  and  findly,  I  utter  them,  I  leave  the  discus 
sion: 


SOCIETY    AND    THE    STATE.  241 

"When  my  eyes  shall  be  turned  to  behold  for  the 
last  time  the  sun  in  heaven,  may  I  not  see  him  shining 
on  the  broken  and  dishonored  fragments  of  a  once 
glorious  Union;  on  States  dissevered,  discordant,  bel 
ligerent;  on  a  land  rent  with  civil  feuds,  or  drenched  it 
may  be  in  fraternal  blood !  Let  their  last  feeble  and 
lingering  glance  rather  behold  the  gorgeous  ensign  of 
the  Republic,  now  known  and  honored  throughout  the 
earth,  still  full  high  advanced,  its  arms  and  trophies 
streaming  in  their  original  luster,  not  a  stripe  erased  or 
polluted,  nor  a  single  star  obscured ;  bearing  for  its 
motto  no  such  miserable  interrogatory  as  'What  is  all 
this  worth?'  nor  those  other  words  of  delusion  and 
folly,  '  Liberty  first,  and  Union  afterwards/  but  every 
where,  spread  all  over  in  characters  of  living  light,  blaz 
ing  on  all  its  ample  folds  as  they  float  over  the  sea  and 
over  the  land  and  in  every  wind  under  the  whole  heav 
ens,  that  other  sentiment,  dear  to  every  true  American ' 
heart,  '  Liberty  and  Union,  now  and  forever,  one  and 

E.  D.  Baker. 


HOW  A  GREAT  PEOPLE  PERISHED. 

221.  In  all  the  history  of  the  past  there  is  but  one 
nation  with  which  the  great  nation  now  growing  up  on 
this  continent  can  be  compared;  but  one  people  which 
has  occupied  the  position  and  exercised  the  influence, 
which  for  good  or  evil,  the  American  people  must  oc 
cupy  and  exert.  A  nation  which  has  left  a  deeper  im 
press  upon  the  life  of  the  race  than  any  other  nation 


242  CALIFORNIA   ANTHOLOGY. 

that  ever  existed;  whose  sway  was  co-extensive  with 
the  known  world;  whose  heroes  and  poets,  and  sages 
and  orators;  are  still  familiar  names  to  us;  whose  liter 
ature  and  art  still  furnish  us  models;  whose  language 
has  enriched  every  modern  tongue,  and  though  long 
dead,  is  still  the  language  of  science  and  of  religion, 
and  whose  jurisprudence  is  the  great  mine  from  which 
our  modern  systems  are  wrought.  That  a  nation  so 
powerful  in  arms,  so  advanced  in  the  arts,  should  perish 
as  Rome  perished:  that  a  civilization  so  widely  diffused, 
should  be  buried  as  was  the  Roman  civilization,  is  the 
greatest  marvel  which  history  presents.  To  the  Roman 
citizen  of  the  time  of  Augustus  or  the  Antonines,  it 
would  have  appeared  as  incredible,  as  utterly  impossi 
ble  that  Rome  could  be  overwhelmed  by  barbarians,  as 
to  the  American  citizen  of  to-day  it  would  appear  im 
possible  that  the  great  American  Republic  could  be 
conquered  by  the  Apaches,  or  the  Chinooks,  our  arts 
forgotten,  and  our  civilization  lost. 

How  did  this  once  incredible  thing  happen?  What 
were  the  hidden  causes  that  sapped  the  strength  and 
eat  out  the  heart  of  this  world-conquering  power,  so 
that  it  crumbled  to  pieces  before  the  shock  of  barbarian 
hoards?  A  Roman  historian  himself  has  told  us: 
"Great  estates  ruined  Italy!"  In  the  land  policy  of 
Rome  may  be  traced  the  secret  of  her  rise,  the  cause  of 
her  fall. 

"To  every  citizen  as  much  land  as  he  himself  may 
use;  he  is  an  enemy  of  the  State  who  desires  any 
more,"  was  the  spirit  of  the  land  policy  which  enabled 
Rome  to  assimilate  so  quickly  the  peoples  that  she  con- 


SOCIETY  AND  THE  STATE.  243 

quered;  that  gave  her  a  body  of  citizens  whose  arms 
were  a  bulwark  against  every  assault,  and  who  carried 
her  standards  in  triumph  in  every  direction.  At  first, 
a  single  acre  constituted  the  patrimony  of  a  Roman; 
afterwards  the  amount  was  increased  to  three  acres  and 
a  half.  These  were  the  heroic  days  of  the  Republic, 
when  every  citizen  seemed  animated  by  a  public  spirit 
and  a  public  virtue  which  made  the  Roman  name  as 
famous  as  it  made  the  Roman  arms  invincible;  when 
Cincinnatus  left  his  two-acre  farm  to  become  Dictator, 
and  after  the  danger  was  over  and  the  State  was  safe, 
returned  to  his  plow;  when  Regulus,  at  the  head  of  a 
conquering  army  in  Africa,  asked  to  be  relieved,  be 
cause  his  single  slave  had  died,  and  there  was  no  one 
to  cultivate  his  little  farm  for  his  family. 

But,  as  wealth  poured  in  from  foreign  conquests,  and 
lust  for  riches  grew,  the  old  policy  was  set  aside.  The 
Senate  granted  away  the  public  domain  in  large  tracts, 
just  as  our  Senate  is  doing  now;  and  the  fusion  of  the 
little  farms  into  large  estates  by  purchase,  by  force,  and 
by  fraud,  went  on,  until  whole  provinces  were  owned  by 
two  or  three  proprietors,  and  chained  slaves  had  taken 
the  place  of  the  sturdy  peasantry  of  Italy.  The  small 
farmers  who  had  given  their  strength  to  Rome,  were 
driven  to  the  cities  to  swell  the  ranks  of  the  proleta 
rians,  and  become  clients  of  the  great  families,  or  abroad 
to  perish  in  the  wars.  There  came  to  be  but  two 
classes — the  enormously  rich,  and  their  dependents  and 
slaves.  Society  thus  constituted  bred  its  destroying 
monsters;  the  old  virtues  vanished,  population  declined, 
arc  sank,  the  old  conquering  race  actually  died  out,  and 


244  CALIFORNIA   ANTHOLOGY. 

Rome  perished,  as  a  modern  historian  puts  it,  from  the 
very  failure  of  the  crop  of  men.  Centuries  ago  this 
happened,  but  the  laws  of  the  universe  are  to-day  what 
they  were  then. — Henry  George. 


CENTENNIAL  ORATION. 

(JULY  4,   1876.) 

222.  The  great  movements  of  mankind  upon  our 
globe,  since  it  became  the  theatre  of  human  life  and 
human  events,  can  never  cease  to  be  the  subject  of 
profoundest  interest  and  loftiest  contemplation.  There 
is  a  spirit  in  man,  urging  him  on  with  the  strong  mo 
mentum  of  eternal  law,  to  a  destiny  that  ever  allures 
him  with  mystic  wonder  and  fascination.  The  earthly 
horizon  of  that  destiny,  ever  retreating,  invites  him  to 
the  full  and  complete  dominion  of  a  world  not  yet  sub 
dued  to  intellectual  and  moral  being.  Generations, 
races  and  nations,  inspired  by  impulse  greater  and 
mightier  than  themselves,  move  forward  in  grand  con 
sentaneous  procession,  and  history  unfurls  her  banners, 
the  symbols  of  eternal  purpose. 

One  of  the  most  sublime  conceptions  of  which  the 
mind  is  capable,  is  the  contemplation  of  the  periods  of 
time  during  which  the  earth  was  being  prepared  to  be 
a  fit  habitation  of  man.  Compared  with  those  periods, 
the  lifetime  of  the  human  race  is  but  a  moment,  or  a 
thought  flashed  by  electric  touch  from  city  to  city.  The 
introduction  of  man  upon  the  earth  is  a  modern  event, 


SOCIETY    AND    THE    STATE.  245 

modern  as  the  morning  of  to-day !  The  Egyptian 
civilization  is  but  of  yesterday,  compared  with  the 
formation  of  the  delta  of  the  Mississippi ;  and  the 
alluvial  plains  of  the  Euphrates,  the  first  abodes  of 
human  society,  were  the  work  of  cycles  and  seons  of 
unrecorded  time.  These  periods  of  time  and  prepara 
tion,  in  the  contemplation  of  which  the  mind  is  op 
pressed  with  the  vague  sense  of  infinity,  suggest,  with 
striking  intellectual  and  moral  force,  the  importance  of 
man's  place  in  the  scale  of  created  things,  and  the 
rank  he  holds  in  the  order  of  being.  The  last  term  in 
an  ascending  series,  involved  in  all  that  goes  before, 
crown  and  summit  of  creation,  end  and  fulfilment  of 
primal  intent  and  purpose.  Science  unfolds  the  order 
of  nature  and  reveals  her  method  and  law,  but  man, 
his  fortunes,  his  deeds,  his  nature  and  his  destiny,  are 
the  noblest  objects  of  thought  and  study.  He  is 
superior  to  nature,  in  that  he  recognizes  the  law  of 
nature  and  the  law  of  his  own  being.  He  discovers 
truth,  good  and  evil,  and  is  haunted  by  the  thought 
that  not  death,  but  increasing  life  is  his  goal.  Progres 
sive  reason  achieves  new  conquests  in  every  age,  and 
can  never  rest  until  it  is  established  upon  the  throne  of 
the  world,  and  the  sublime  affirmation  is  realized, 
"  Thou  hast  put  all  things  under  his  feet."  Man,  so 
ciety,  nationality,  government,  give  intellectual  and 
moral  import  to  a  material  universe,  and  the  progress 
of  history  is  the  elevation  of  the  moral  character  of 
mankind. 

The  American  Continent,  earliest   in  geologic   time 
of  all  the  lands  of  the   globe,  was   reserved   to  these 


246  CALIFORNIA    ANTHOLOGY. 

later  days  to  be  the  theatre  of  a  new  cycle  of  human 
culture,  and  a  new  display  of  the  power  of  human 
society. 

The  ancient  oriental  civilizations  had  flourished  for 
thousands  and  tens  of  thousands  of  years,  and  sent 
forth  those  great  migrations  that  founded  the  succession 
of  Asiatic  Empires,  reared  the  fair  forms  of  Grecian 
culture  and  the  strength  of  Roman  arms,  made  Europe 
the  nursery  of  nations,  and  England  the  foster-mother 
of  the  modern  world.  Christianity,  that  religion  which 
more  than  any  other  seems  adapted  to  universal  man, 
had  kindled  its  holy  signals  on  the  hills  of  Judea  nearly 
fifteen  centuries  before  the  Pilot  of  Genoa  was  born. 
Rome  expired  a  thousand  years  before.  During  all 
these  vast  movements  of  mankind,  and  through  these 
historic  ages,  when  the  soil  of  the  world  was  being  pre 
pared  to  receive  .the  seed  of  the  Modern  age,  the 
American  Continent  lay  concealed  behind  the  horizon. 
The  Ptolemaic  system  held  the  universe  in  the  thral 
dom  of  the  senses,  and  religion,  not  yet  allied  to  reason, 
enforced  the  thrall.  The  mind  was  enveloped  in  sense, 
and  the  sight  of  the  eye,  and  the  hearing  of  the  ear, 
interpreted  the  world.  •  The  sun  rose  and  set,  and  the 
earth  was  an  extended  plain.  Imagination,  strong 
angel  of  truth,  had  not  looked  with  undazzled  eye  upon 
that  inaccessible  glory  which  the  senses  cannot  touch. 
The  outward  manifestations  of  power  filled  the  mind 
with  vague  wonder  and  fear,  while  reason  had  not  yet 
discovered  their  law.  It  was  the  seed-time  of  history, 
the  germinating  period  of  human  thought. 


SOCIETY  AND  THE  STATE.  247 

It  is  now  four  hundred  years  since  the  European 
world  began  to  feel  those  premonitory  pains  that  go 
before  the  births  of  time. 

How  the  great  ideas,  that  now  govern  the  world  as 
the  common  thought  of  men,  first  dawned  upon  the 
solitudes  of  genius,  is  beyond  the  power  of  man  to  tell. 
It  is  common  to  account  for  it  in  the  intellectual  law  of 
suggestion  or  association.  Accordingly,  we  are  told 
that  the  apple  falling  from  the  tree  in  Newton's  garden 
suggested  the  law  of  gravitation.  But  this  is  a  mis 
take.  The  conception  is  in  the  mind;  the  apple  does 
not  convey  it.  It  comes  as  the  morning  comes;  it 
comes  as  the  ripening  of  the  grain;  it  comes  as  the 
flush  of  the  vintage,  distilled  in  mystery  and  silence- 
but  behold,  a  new  heavens  and  a  new  earth,  without 
noise  or  fear!  The  round  world,  as  it  lay  in  the  serene 
imagination  of  Columbus,  is  one  of  the  most  striking 
illustrations  of  the  power  of  an  idea  that  history  records. 
His  heroism  to  obey  the  idea,  and,  contrary  to  the  opin 
ions  of  his  age,  to  follow  it  across  the  trackless  deep, 
gives  him  an  undisputed  rank  in  the  hierarchy  of  faith, 
and  an  immovable  pedestal  in  the  temple  of  earthly 
fame.  Those  masterly  achievements  of  fidelity  to  a 
a  thought  that  characterized  the  discovery  of  the  New 
World  were  fit  precursors  of  the  fortunes  of  that  New 
World,  destined  as  it  was  to  be  the  field  of  new  princi 
ples,  in  which  the  majority  of  mankind  did  not  believe. 
The  birth  of  navigation  may  be  said  to  have  been  sim 
ultaneous  with  the  discoveries  of  the  fifteenth  century. 
Among  the  conquests  that  man  has  made  over  the  ob 
stacles  that  the  barriers  of  the  world  offer  to  his  pro- 


248  CALIFORNIA    ANTHOLOGY. 

gress,  navigation  must  take  first  rank.  It  spans  the 
awful  abysses  of  the  sea,  makes  the  communication  of 
nations  and  races  possible,  supplements  human  wants 
by  the  exchange  of  the  products  of  the  earth  and  of 
human  skill,  and  tends  by  ks  mighty  processes  of  inter 
course  and  communication  to  establish  the  equilibrium 
of  the  condition  of  mankind.  Navigation  was  the  be 
ginning  of  that  system  of  communication  upon  the 
eartli  which  is  the  striking  feature  of  our  own  day,  and 
makes  man  at  home  in  the  world. 

A  true  theory  of  the  solar  and  planetary  worlds  had 
vaguely  emerged  from  chaos,  in  the  devout  reason  of 
Copernicus;  and  the  steady  lights  of  the  upper  deep 
became  the  faithful  guides  of  the  trustful  mariner,  as 
he  ploughed  the  dark  longitudes  from  land  to  land. 
Copernicus  did  not  announce  and  defend  his  theory,  for 
fear  of  the  Church,  but  his  mind  was  the  seed-plot  of 
the  idea  of  modern  astronomy,  and  was  one  of  the 
powerful  causes  that  contributed  to  the  intellectual  con 
quest  of  the  material  world  at  that  period.  When 
lying  on  his  death-bed,  and  near  his  end,  he  united  the 
expression  of  his  devout  faith  and  inspired  intelligence 
in  sentiments  such  as  the  sacred  lyrist  has  embodied  in 
his  verse: 

Ye  golden  lamps  of  heaven  !   farewell ! 

With  all  your  feeble  light, 
Farewell,  thou  ever  changing  moon — 

Pale  empress  of  the  night. 
And  thou,  refulgent  orb  of  day! 

In  brighter  flames  arrayed — 
My  soul,  which  springs  beyond  thy  sphere, 

No  more  demands  thine  aid. 


SOCIETY  AND  THE  STATE.  249 

The  two  ideas,  one  of  a  round  world,  as  it  lay  in  the 
brooding  mind  of  Columbus;  the  other  of  the  solar 
system,  as  it  dawned  in  the  intelligence  of  Copernicus, 
were  the  sovereigns  of  that  time. 

But  there  was  a  nobler  moment  yet.  It  may  be 
summed  up  in  that  general  and  somewhat  vague  ex 
pression,  the  Reformation.  In  all  the  complex  causes 
and  relations  which  conspired  in  that  event,  the  pith 
and  quick  of  it  was  that  it  centered  in  man  himself,  and 
concerned  his  rights,  his  duties,  his  nature,  and  his  des 
tiny.  The  Reformation  was  to  man  himself  what  the 
round  world  and  the  solar  system  were  to  his  concep 
tion  of  the  material  universe.  It  was  the  free  activity 
of  the  individual  mind  in  fealty  to  eternal,  moral  law. 
It  brought  order  into  the  moral  world,  by  making  the 
individual  a  centre  of  power.  It  abolished  authorities 
imposed  from  without,  and  instated  the  perceptions  of 
reason  and  conscience  within.  It  appealed  from  the 
few  to  the  many;  from  the  priest  to  the  people;  from 
the  traditions  of  the  elders  to  the  mind  and  heart  of 
man.  It  was  not  the  revival  of  an  old  life,  but  the  in 
spiration  of  a  new;  the  transfer  of  civilization  to  a 
new  center  of  development.  The  old  syscem  had  com 
pleted  its  orbit;  but  that  orbit  was  not  the  complete 
cycle  of  human  progress,  ever  widening  its  range  and 
rising  higher.  Men  are  the  conscious  instruments  of 
powers,  principles  and  ideas  which  they  do  not  fully 
comprehend.  They  are  the  exponents  of  a  period,  but 
they  do  not  originate  its  principles.  It  is  a  mistake  to 
suppose  that  Martin  Luther  originated  the  Reformation, 
or  that  he  was  the  father  of  it  in  any  sense.  The 


250  CALIFORNIA   ANTHOLOGY. 

Reformation  would  have  come  if  Luther  had  not  been, 
and  the  moral  grandeur  of  his  figure  in  history  is  de 
rived  from  his  ability  to  discover  the  signs  of  the  times, 
to  read  the  horoscope  of  the  period  and  confess  the  era 
of  God.  If  you  inquire  for  those  mighty  thoughts  and 
sublime  impulses,  which  are  the  seeds  of  human  history, 
you  ascend  to  those  heights  where  genius  o'ertops  in 
telligence  and  insight  becomes  inspiration.  The 
settlement  of  this  continent  by  a  strong  and  powerful 
race,  who  planted  on  these  shores  the  seed  of  a  new 
historic  period,  was  the  result  of  the  Reformation.  It 
was  a  movement  that  had  its  origin  in  the  noblest 
moods  of  the  human  mind.  Let  no  cheap  animosities  be 
tween  Catholic  and  Protestant  dim  the  clear,  calm, 
historic  vision;  let  no  jealousies  of  the  provincialisms 
of  human  feeling  intrude  themselves  into  that  august 
presence. 

Among  the  men  who  contributed  by  force  of  moral 
genius  to  reduce  the  chaotic  elements  of  that  period  to 
order  and  form,  thus  supplying  the  practical  working  ma 
terials  of  progress,  there  is  one  whose  name  and  whose 
principles  have  been  singularly  associated  with  the  life  of 
American  institutions — I  mean  the  lawyer,  theologian, 
statesman  of  Geneva,  John  Calvin.  It  was  he  who 
gathered  up  the  scattered  moral  powers  of  the  Reform 
ation,  condensed  them  in  definite,  dogmatic,  popular 
forms,  and  administered  the  affairs  of  religion  in  a  re 
publican  spirit,  thus  making  his  horribile  dccrctum  fatcor 
the  seed-plot  of  Republican  liberty.  If  his  doctrine 
was  cruel,  it  was  the  offspring  of  a  cruel  age.  It  was 
not  Protestant  or  Catholic  that  was  cruel;  it  was  the 


SOCIETY   AND    THE    STATE.  251 

condition  of  the  human  mind.  That  terrible  doctrine, 
which  now  is  like  a  nest  of  a  former  year  from  which 
the  brood  has  flown,  pervaded  Christendom,  and  sent 
forth  a  mighty  race  that  fought  against  tyranny  every 
where,  always  sided  with  the  people,  gave  victory  to 
the  plebeian  Roundhead  over  the  lordly  Cavalier  and 
sent  forth  a  new  Israel  to  take  possession  of  this  prom 
ised  land  of  mankind  and  liberty.  Calvinism  was  dis 
persed  throughout  Europe,  and  probably  influenced 
more  minds  than  any  other  system  of  doctrine  or  polity 
devised  by  man.  Scotland  was  imbued  with  it,  and 
through  her  philosophy  it  tinged  the  thought  of  the  in 
tellectual  world.  The  Huguenot  stock  of  South  Caro 
lina  inherited  it.  William  Penn  was  taught  by  a 
famous  Calvinist.  The  early  Dutch  colonists  of  New 
York  were  of  that  lineage,  and  the  settlers  of  Plymouth 
were  of  that  athletic  race. 

The  system  of  free  schools  was  devised  by  Calvin's 
brain  and  heart,  and  beyond  the  boundaries  of  sect,  his 
hand,  unconscious  of  its  power,  scattered  the  seeds  of 
Republican  liberty.  As  our  American  Idealist  has  wove 
it  into  verse  that  shall  vibrate  on  all  the  chords  of 
time,  he 

''Wrought  in  a  sad  sincerity; 
Himself  from  God  he  could  not  free; 
He  builded  better  than  he  knew — 
The  conscious  stone  to  beauty  grew." 

In  the  hard  and  thorny  husk  of  a  cruel  system  were 
hid  the  seeds  of  a  new  life  among  the  nations,  and  a 
new  era  for  mankind. 


252  CALIFORNIA   ANTHOLOGY. 

Thus  the  life  of  American  institutions  had  its  root. in 
the  old  world.  The  health  of  the  scion  attests  the 
vigor  of  the  native  stock.  Whatever  may  have  been 
the  exploits  of  former  races  on  this  continent,  whatever 
power  or  glory  their  civilization  displayed,  they  acted 
no  part  in  the  drama  of  the  new  era,  and  contributed 
nothing  to  the  life  of  the  new  age.  The  traces  of  the 
mound-builders  are  a  melancholy  record  of  a  race  that 
we  may  gratefully  believe  fulfilled  its  destiny,  and  had 
no  reason  longer  to  be  upon  the  earth.  The  native 
Indian — humble  child  of  the  forest,  weak  and  passionate 
—dashes  himself  against  the  walls  of  the  world,  or  dis 
solves  like  ice  flowing  into  tropic  seas.  American  civi 
lization  is  of  European  and  English  origin.  It  is  a 
new  center  of  human  culture,  from  a  seed  matured  in 
the  highest  and  best  experience  of  mankind. 

It  must  be  confessed,  humanly  speaking,  that  the 
union  of  the  American  Colonies,  first  against  foreign 
encroachment  and  then  under  a  constitutional  govern 
ment,  was  a  happy  accident.  But  history  distils  wis 
dom  and  honor  and  power  from  human  folly.  The 
mad  councils  of  George  III  lost  him  his  colonies,  but 
created  a  new  nation.  Had  a  better  spirit  prevailed, 
England  might  have  been  the  mother  of  the  Republic, 
or  two  Englands  might  have  ruled  the  world.  The  in 
dependence  of  the  American  Colonies  was  brought 
about  by  those  mixed  causes,  which,  to  the  superficial 
observer,  seem  to  be  an  inexplicable  jumble  of 
stupid  blunder,  blind  folly  and  mad  self-will.  But  to  the 
philosophic  historian,  they  are  that  apparent  chaos  of 
human  events  and  human  things  over  which  the  spirit 


SOCIETY  AND  THE  STATE.  253 

of  order  ever  broods,  bringing  forth  the  true,  the  beau 
tiful  and  good.  Evil  is  never  unmixed,  and  the  truth 
enveloped  in  error,  falling  upon  the  furrows  of  the 
world,  expands,  bursts  its  environments,  and  buds  and 
blooms. 

Doubtless  there  is  much  vague  declamation  and 
would-be  philosophic  gravity  in  talking  about  the  "idea" 
of  our  government,  or  the  "idea"  of  our  institutions. 
There  is  probably  n.o  proper  sense  in  which  it  can  be 
said  that  government  has  any  idea  or  theory  at  all. 
Certainly  the  science  of  government,  if  there  is  such  a 
science,  is  not  an  exact  science,  and  its  principles  are 
continually  applied  to  new  facts  and  new  conditions,  in 
a  new  method.  The  unfolding  of  a  principle  is  a 
growth,  not  a  mechanic  law.  Thus,  in  all  enterprise  of 
man's  affairs,  in  all  administration  of  human  things,  the 
grand  question  is:  Is  it  only  a  dead  fact,  or  a  living 
law?  Admitting  fully  all  the  limitations  that  practice 
.sets  to  theory,  still  theory 'goes  before  practice,  and  in 
cludes  practice.  But  the  only  theory,  or  idea,  which  a 
free  government  can  have,  is  the  growth  and  develop 
ment  of  the  principle  on  which  it  rests.  This  is  the 
difference  between  constitutional  liberty  and  absolute 
monarchy.  The  one  is  the  arbitrary  application  of  a 
rule;  the  other  is  the  unfolding  of  a  principle.  The 
one  is  a  wooden  fact,  the  other  is  an  inspired  truth. 
And  thus  in  respect  of  ourselves  and  our  historic  origin 
as  a  people  and  a  nation,  the  question  is:  What  was 
there  at  the  bottom  of  this  display  of  social  order,  that 
has  so  gone  on  where  man  nor  angel  never  dreamed? 
The  early  settlers  of  thp  continent  had  no  conception 


254  CALIFORNIA    ANTHOLOGY. 

of  it.  They  brought  with  them  the  mature  fruit  of 
human  experience,  the  latest  that  hung  upon  the 
branches  of  the  tree  of  life.  That  fruit  was  the  con 
viction,  nay,  more,  transcending  all  reasoning  process, 
the  insight  of  inspired  moral  genius,  that  man's  nature 
prefigures  his  liberty,  and  that  he  is  and  must  be  free 
to  act  of  himself  under  moral  law!  That  conviction, 
that  insight,  was  new.  The  men  themselves  did  not 
know  what  it  meant  nor  where  it  would  lead.  And 
why  should  they?  A  man  can  not  tell  even  what  his 
house  will  cost  beforehand,  and  why  should  they  under 
stand  the  vision  of  truth  that  had  never  been  applied 
to  the  guidance  and  government  of  men  ?  The  world 
had  been  governed  by  force,  invading  even  the  recesses 
of  thought.  Exclusive  powers  and  privileges  were 
held  and  exercised  by  the  few,  and  the  idea  of  man  as 
man  had  no  place  on  earth.  Even  the  Almighty 
Maker  and  Ruler  had  his  favorites,  and  no  long-minded 
eternities  of  beneficent  power  brooded  over  the  destin 
ies  of  mankind.  One  of  the  most  influential  races  that 
has  ever  lived  on  the  face  of  the  earth,  inhabiting  a  lit 
tle  country  on  the  borders  of  the  Levant,  that  the  mod 
ern  traveller  can  "  do"  in  the  saddle  in  five  or  seven 
days,  made  even  religion  aristocratic,  claimed  that  God 
was  their  God,  and  that  they  were  His  people  to  the 
exclusion  of  everybody  else.  I  am  not  indifferent  to 
the  historic  development  of  opinion,  nor  to  the  influ 
ence  of  Hebrew  Theism  upon  the  destiny  of  the  human 
world  ;  but  it  furnishes  a  striking  illustration  of  the  ex- 
clusiveness  of  human  thought,  associated  as  it  common 
ly  is,  with  the  monopoly  of  God  and  contempt  for  man. 


SOCIETY  AND  THE  STATE.  255 

But  truth  mingled  with  error  tends  to  work  itself  clear. 
When  we  talk  about  the  theory  of  free  government, 
we  mean,  if  we  mean  anything,  that  the  bottom  of  it  is 
the  principle  of  liberty,  as  it  is  elementary  and  funda 
mental  in  human  nature.  '  And  like  other  principles,  if 
it  is  a  principle,  it  is  to  be  followed, .  and  not  to  be  led. 
If  it  is  based  upon  the  equality  of  men — that  is,  the 
equality  of  human  nature — it  is  the  affirmation  that 
man  everywhere  is  man — made  of  the  same  powers, 
passions  and  affections ;  that  he  has  the  same  origin 
and  the  same  destiny.  The  senses  are  the  same  in  all ; 
intelligence  is  the  same  in  all ;  affection  is  the  same  in 
all  ;  reason  is  the  same  in  all ;  conscience  is  the  same 
in  all  ;  faith  is  the  same  in  all.  These  may  be  deve 
loped  in  different  degrees,  and  expressed  in  different 
terms,  but  they  have  their  root  in  the  same  soil — of  the 
same  common  nature.  As  I  was  riding,  the  other  day 
in  the  suburbs  of  the  city,  among  the  sand  hills,  that 
form  so  striking  and  bold  contrast  with  the  'cultivated 
and  powerful  portions  of  the  town,  I  met  two  children, 
who  by  their  habit  and  manner,  showed  that  they  be 
longed  to  the  worthy,  respectable  poor.  Their  frugal, 
tidy  dress,  their  unstockinged  feet,  their  modesty  in  pre 
sence  of  a  stranger,  flushed  the  very  sand  with  loveli 
ness  ;  and  in  their  little  sun-burnt  hands  they  held 
loosely  a  few  flowers,  such  as  Nature  gives  in  her 
bounty  to  relieve  her  desert  places  ;  and  they  were 
comparing  the  colors,  as  the  sunlight  poured  down  its 
golden  rays  and  filled  the  urns  of  beauty.  I  said  to 
myself,  Behold  the  identity  of  human  nature !  The 

same  love  of  the  beautiful  that  fascinates  the  soul  of  a 
17 


256  CALIFORNIA    ANTHOLOGY. 

Titian  or  a  Tintoretto !  This  is  what  we  mean  by  the 
equality  of  men,  the  identity  of  human  nature.  This  is 
the  seed  of  human  progress,  and  the  promise  of  man's 
destiny.  Our  Republican  Democracy  is  founded  on 
that.  It  has  always  encountered  suspicion  and  jealousy 
and  evil  foreboding  from  those  who  are  not  imbued 
with  it ;  for  if  there  are  those  who  are  too  ignorant  and 
wretched  and  benighted  to  be  free,  there  are  those,  also, 
who  are  intelligent,  yet  who  lack  the  moral  genius  to 
discern  that  they  belong  to  the  human  race. 

The  history  of  the  country  for  the  hundred  years  on 
whose  summit  we  now  stand,  has  been  little  else  than 
the  development  of  this  principle.  On  these  mighty 
waters  the  nation  sails,  and  the  horizon  forever  recedes 
and  earth  and  sky  never  meet.  Our  principles,  so  far 
from  being  exhausted,  are  only  beginning  to  be  unfold 
ed,  and  we  may  justly  expect  that  they  are  to  play  a 
leading  part  in  the  fortunes  and  destiny  of  mankind.  If 
human  progress  means  anything,  it  means  the  enjoy 
ment  of  the  highest  privileges  and  immunities  of  exist 
ence  by  all ;  it  means  a  fair  field  for  every  man  to  pur 
sue  that  line  of  thought  and  action  which  his  own  indi 
viduality  directs,  and  which,  to  him,  is  the  purpose  of 
his  being.  All  truth  is  expansive,  and  greater  than 
men  think  when  they  first  adopt  it.  The  smallest  seed 
of  liberty  when  it  is  sown  becomes  a  tree,  and  strug 
gling  human  aspirations  take  refuge  in  its  branches,  or 
refresh  themselves  under  its  shadow  for  new  resistance 
against  ancient  and  venerable  wrong.  He  who  would 
confine  the  influence  of  free  institutions  to  this  theater 
of  our  display,  would  make  a  great  mistake.  The 


SOCIETY   AND    THE    STATE.  257 

winds  are  its  messengers,  the  lightnings  do  its  biddings, 
the  ocean  is  its  mediator.  The  heart  of  man,  source 
of  restless  imaginations  and  never  satisfied  longings, 
aspires  to  it  from  afar. 

It  would  be  impossible,  on  an  occasion  like  the  pres 
ent,  to  recount  the  events,  the  deeds,  the  persons  of 
this  century  of  republican  liberty.  That  is  the  orifice  of 
the  historian,  the  philosopher  and  the  poet.  It  is 
enough  for  us  to-day  to  take  counsel  of  our  principles 
and  reaffirm  them  as  the  profound  conviction  of  our 
minds,  attested  by  the  experience  of  a  century.  It  was 
announced  a  hundred  years  ago  by  the  founders  of  the 
government  that  all  men  are  free  and  equal.  We  have 
read  it  to-day  from  the  famous  Declaration,  and  it  will 
be  read  by  those  who  shall  come  after  us  down  the 
rolling  tide  of  centuries  to  the  latest  recorded  syllable 
of  time.  It  is  no  contrivance  of  extemporaneous 
device;  it  is  no  rule  for  the  exigency  of  the  moment, 
cheap  subterfuge  of  tyrants.  It  is  in  the  eternal  nature 
of  truth,  and  things,  and  man  and  God.  Neither  is  it 
any  vagary  or  "glittering  generality"  in  our  minds  but 
of  clear,  decided  import  and  energy.  It  is  as  old  as 
the  heavens,  and  as  new  as  to-day,  and  we  claim  for  it 
that  immortality  that  belongs  to  essential  truth. 

We  affirm  and  declare  to-day,  as  the  fathers  did  in 
1776,  that  all  men  are  free!  And  we  mean  by  it  that 
fundamental  fact  of  human  nature  by  virtue  of  which 
man  is  man,  endowed  by  heaven  with  the  power  to 
choose  between  good  and  evil,  and  to  direct  his  course 
towards  those  ends  that  seem  to  him  best !  We  mean 
that  the  office  of  Government  is  to  protect  that  freedom, 


258  CALIFORNIA   ANTHOLOGY. 

and  not  to  encroach  upon  it;  to  throw  around  it  the 
environments  of  law,  that  under  law  it. may  be  liberty 
indeed ! 

We  affirm  and  declare  to-day,  as  the  fathers  did  in 
1776,  that  all  men  are  equal!  Hear  it,  O  Heaven!  and 
give  ear  unto  it,  O  Earth!  We  mean  by  it  the  identity 
of  that  nature  whose  inspirations  of  reason  and  con 
science  are  the  same  in  their  eternal  quality  and  divine 
essence!  We  mean  that  reason  is  reason,  that  conscience 
is  conscience,  that  imagination  is  imagination,  and  that 
the  progress  of  mankind  is  grounded  in  this  common 
nature  of  man.  On  this  we  base  our  hope  of  human 
progress,  and  our  faith  in  human  destiny.  Does  expe 
rience  give  any  ground  for  that  hope  and  faith  ? 

Human  society  on  this  continent  for  a  hundred  years, 
has  been  led  forth  under  the  power  of  the  principles 
which  we  affirm  and  declare  to-day.  A  continent  has 
been  subdued  to  culture.  A  degree  of  external  human 
comfort  has  been  attained  and  enjoyed,  that  probably 
has  not  been  surpassed  in  any  portion  of  the  earth,  or 
in  any  period  of  history.  Let  us  cheerfully  accord 
whatever  is  due  to  the  cheapness  and  fertility  of  the 
soil,  but  let  us  also  be  just  to  human  energies.  The 
results  of  scientific  research  have  been  applied  to  the 
arts  of  life,  and  whatever  pertains  to  man's  conquest 
over  the  material  world  has  been  made  as  complete 
here  as  in  any  other  country.  The  area  of  the  country 
has  been  extended  by  peace  and  by  war  until  its  bor 
ders  are  laved  by  both  oceans  through  twenty  degrees 
of  latitude.  The  country  to-day  presents  a  theatre  of 


SOCIETY   AND    THE    STATE.  259 

world-grandeur  for  the  display  of  free  Constitutional 
Government. 

The  affairs  of  the  Government  have  been  adminis 
tered  by  those  whom  the  people  have  chosen.  Uni 
versal  suffrage  makes  revolution  unnecessary,  by  giving 
every  man  the  right  to  appeal  to  the  ballot  as  the  final 
remedy  of  all  public  wrong.  We  have  never  had  under 
this  plan  a  wicked  or  dissolute  President,  and  if  we  ever 
had  a  weak  one,  the  people  have  been  steady  enough 
to  endure  his  weakness,  conscious  of.  their  strength. 
We  have  never  had  a  corrupt  or  mercenary  Judge,  and 
the  judicial  mind  and  ethic  of  the  country,  I  speak 
firmly  without  boasting,  compare  favorably  with  the 
judicial  mind  and  ethic  of  Christendom.  The  bad 
inheritance  of  slavery,  bequeathed  to  us  from  the  an 
cient  estate,  we  esteem  no  longer  a  portion  of  the 
nation's  wealth,  and  have  absolved  ourselves  from  its 
obligations  by  the  blood  of  the  sons  of  men.  We  have 
received  from  the  nations  of  the  earth  and  the  islands 
of  the  sea,  more  than  five  millions  of  men,  welcoming 
them  to  fairer  opportunities.  We  have  entrusted  re 
ligion  to  the  religious  sentiments  of  human  nature, 
without  the  interference  or  support  of  the  State,  and 
the  free  contributions  of  men  surpass  the  tribute  of 
regal  splendors. 

We  have  laid  the  foundation  of  a  system  of  educa 
tion  for  all  in  making  the  public  school  free,  and  in 
making  it  secular.  Its  benefits  are  only  beginning  to 
be  felt,  but  the  mind  of  the  country  is  awake,  and  we 
may  expect  the  best  results  of  a  system  that  has  an 
ideal  excellence  beyond  any  present  practice.  We  live 


260  CALIFORNIA   ANTHOLOGY. 

in  obedience  to  order  and  law,  without  violence;  and 
good  feeling  and  good  manners  shed  their  invisible, 
mighty  protection  over  all.  American  society  has  never 
required  a  standing  army  to  enforce  order  upon  the 
people.  We  feel  that  the  Government  is  steady,  be 
cause  its  base  is  broad — reaching  to  the  freedom  and 
equal  rights  of  every  man — and  that,  in  the  long  run, 
the  laws  which  the  people  make  themselves  they  will 
respect. 

One  hundred  years  ago  the  foundations  of  this  city 
(San  Francisco)  were  laid  by  the  ancient  monarchy  of 
Spain.  If  the  principles  which  I  have  rehearsed  are 
true;  if  the  attainments  that  have  been  made  under 
them  are  a  just  expression  of  their  wisdom  and  power, 
we  may  take  pride  and  gratitude  in  our  citizenship,  and 
renew  our  vow  to  the  freedom  and  equality  of  men. 
Let  mighty  salvos  proclaim  it !  Let  banners  wave  in 
proud  homage  and  triumphant  joy !  Let  the  sea  roar, 
and  the  fullness  thereof!  Let  us  bid  the  future  genera 
tions  hail !  Hail  ye  happy  races  yet  unborn  that  shall 
receive  such  an  inheritance !  Let  the  people  lift  up 
their  voice:  Yea,  let  the  people  lift  up  their  voice: 
Te  Deum  Laudamus. — Rev.  Horatio  Stebbins. 


VTI. 

FRATERNAL  SOCIETIES 


PART    VII. 

FRATERNAL   SOCIETIES 


FREEMASONRY. 

223.  THE  TEMPLE  OF  SOLOMON  must  stand  as  it 
was  built.     It  could  not  enlarge   itself.     Itt  could  not 
bud  with  smaller  temples,  and  then  take  chem  in  under 
a  widening  roof  or  a  swelling  dome.     Neither,  when 
some  of  its  pillars  decayed,  could  it  restore  its  own  de 
crease,  as   the   living  cedars  of  Lebanon    repair  their 
wastes    and    renew   their  leaves.      But   our   conscious 
temple  does  all  this,  and  noiselessly.    It  fills  in  its  losses; 
it  enlarges  its  sweep  and  sway;    it  does  it  through  men 
of  all   conditions   and  classes  and   races;    and   still    it 
stands  in  its  old  proportions,  though  in  greater  ampli 
tude — symmetrical,  mysterious,  sublime. — Thos.  Starr 
King. 

224.  EVERYWHERE,  order  is   the   great   interest. 
What  humanity  needs  is  the  fulfillment  of  the  indica 
tions  of   nature;    freedom   with  order;    a  proper  con 
sciousness  of  worth  in  every  breast.     A  recognition  by 
each  man  of  the  worth  and  claims  of  every  other;  and 
an  acknowledgement  by  all  of  a  common  and  controlling 
law.     This  idea  of  order,  fulfilled  in  the  architecture  of 


262  CALIFORNIA   ANTHOLOGY. 

nature,  is  committed  as  a  trust  to  our  fraternity,  and  the 
proper  reverence  for  it  is  poured  out  continually  through 
the  influence  of  our  hallowed  bonds. — Thomas  Starr 
King. 

226.  THIS  is  the  most  remarkable  social  organiza 
tion  in  the  world.  None  on  the  globe,  with  half  so 
many  elements  in  its  composition,  is  so  old.  We  are 
told  that  excavations  made  under  modern  Jerusalem 
disclose  remnants  of  the  old  city  in  various  periods  of 
its  history.  Portions  of  the  massive  masonry  of  the 
time  of  Solomon  are  uncovered.  Above  these  appear 
fragments  of  the  work  of  Zerubbabel.  On  a  higher 
historic  stratum  are  specimens  of  workmanship  from 
the  age  of  Herod  the  Great;  and  still  above  these,  but 
below  the  level  of  the  present  city,  are  remains  of  the 
constructive  toil  ordered  by  Justinian.  We  delight  to 
feel  that  the  past,  measured  by  as  many  ages,  is  under 
us;  but  it  is  not  beneath  us  in  a  broken  symmetry  and 
a  dead  grandeur,  as  under  Jerusalem.  It  is  rather 
beneath  us  as  the  roots  are  beneath  a  tree,  and  as  the 
central  rings  are  hidden  in  the  trunk.  They  give 
power  and  pith  to  the  structure  still.  They  are  part  of 
its  present  majesty,  sources  of  its  living  vigor,  prophe 
cies  of  its  future  strength. — Thomas  Starr  King. 

226.  No  EDIFICE  which  •  our  ancient  brethren 
reared  was  equal  to  the  living  structure  of  which  they 
and  we  are  portions.  How  often  we  read  or  hear  with 
pride,  that  in  the  building  of  the  first  temple,  the  stones 
were  made  ready  before  they  were  brought  together; 


FRATERNAL    SOCIETIES.  263 

so  that  there  was  neither  hammer,  nor  ax,  nor  any  tool 
of  iron  heard  in  the  house  while  it  was  building.  What 
is  that  to  the  growth  of  our  Order  itself?  How  quiet 
the  process,  yet  how  constant !  Who  hears  the  noise 
of  it  ?  Who  sees  or  knows  ,when  the  sound  timber  and 
the  approved  stones  are  brought  together,  and  fitted  and 
lifted  to  their  place,  amidst  the  roar  and  strife,  arid 
selfishness  of  the  world?  Yet,  in  thousands  of  towns 
and  cities — in  every  zone — in  almost  all  communities 
and  tongues  of  men,  this  work,  in  substantial  sameness 
of  method  and  pledge,  is  going  on. — Thos.  Starr  King. 

227.  Do  WE  ever  get  tired  of  the  toils  and  tax  of 
charity  ?  Suppose  the  sun  did !  What  does  he  receive 
in  homage  or  obedience  from  the  orbs  that  swing  round 
him,  in  comparison  with  what  he  gives — all  his  light, 
all  his  heat,  all  his  vitality,  for  the  blessing  of  four-score 
worlds  ?  Shall  we  complain  of  the  demand  upon  our 
treasuries,  or  our  private  purses,  for  the  sacred  funds  of 
the  Masonic  Board  of  Relief?  What  if  the  sea  grum 
bled  at  the  assessment  which  the  mighty  sun — the  Most 
Worshipful  Grand  Master  of  the  System — levies  on  its 
substance !  Every  day  the  sun  touches  its  stores  with 
its  wand  of  light,  and  says  Give,  give.  And  it  obeys. 
Evaporation  is  its  tax,  constantly  demanded,  constantly 
given.  Remember,  brethren,  that  every  cloud  you  see, 
whether  stretched  in  a  beautiful  bar  across  the  east  at 
sunrise,  or  hanging  in  pomp  over  the  gorgeous  pavilion 
of  the  retiring  day,  is  part  of  the  contribution  for  the 
general  relief  of  nature,  assessed  by  the  lordly  sun. 
The  water  which  the  ocean  keeps  is  salt.  Pour  a  bucket 


264  CALIFORNIA    ANTHOLOGY. 

of  it  on  a  hill  of  corn,  or  a  garden  bed,  and  it  kills  it. 
The  water  which  the  ocean  gives  is  fresh,  and  descends 
in  blessing  after  it  rides  in  beauty  or  majesty  on  the 
viewless  couriers  of  the  air.  Nature  tells  us  that  to 
give  is  to  live. —  Thomas  Starr  King. 

228.  No  WORK  OF  man's  hand  can  withstand  the 
silent  tooth  of  time.  The  mighty  monuments  of  the 
forgotten  past  reveal  themselves  to  us  only  in  dim  tra 
ditions,  or  in  almost  undistinguishable  fragments,  puz 
zling  the  lore  of  the  antiquarian  and  baffling  the  light 
of  science.  They  leave  us  like  the  mariners  on  the 
wrecking  midnight  sea,  looking — oh,  how  hopelessly— 
for  the  coming  light.  But  principles  cannot  die.  Truth 
is  eternal.  Justice,  equality,  fraternal  love,  charity, 
faith,  hope,  are  invulnerable  and  immortal,  all.  They 
are  emanations  of  the  eternal  good — sparks  from  the 
eternal  fire — drops  from  the  overflowing  river  of  im 
mortal  life.  So  with  the  inner  life  of  Masonry.  Its 
temples  may  totter  to  the  dust  and  its  visible  tokens  be 
utterly  lost,  but  IT  will  survive.  Its  spirit  is  the  spirit 
of  the  "All-working  Good" — its  work  is  the  practical 
embodiment  of  all-working  benevolence — its  mission  on 
earth  is  but  the  reflection  and  exemplification  of  that 
divinest  of  all  virtues — Charity! 

We  speak  of  martyrdoms,  and  they  are  glorious. 
We  speak  of  heroisms,  and  they  are  glorious.  How 
they  stand  out  in  the  past,  like  land-marks  in  the  life- 
gloom,  these  martyrs  for  the  good,  these  heroes  for  the 
right!  Some  have  sunk  on  the  battle-field;  some  have 
watered  the  scaffold  with  their  blood;  others  have  per- 


FRATERNAL    SOCIETIES.  265 

ished  in  the  agonies  of  fire.  These  have  been  of  one 
race  and  language;  those  of  another.  This  endured 
all  things  for  one  faith,  that  for  another;  but  all, 
whatever  their  nation,  or  sect,  or  lineage,  were  alike  the 
warriors  of  humanity,  and  perished  that  mankind 
might  be  free.  The  great  and  good  of  all  eras  form 
one  great  brotherhood.  Thank  God,  for  having  thus 
linked  distant  ages  together  by  the  ties  of  a  common 
sympathy.  The  great  souls,  scattered  along  the  high 
way  of  history,  are  bound  one  to  another  by  an  electric 
chain  ;  and  thus  the  influence  of  heroic  deeds  thrills 
from  century  to  century  down  the  long  avenue  of  time. 

—Dr.  Henry  M.  Gray. 

229.  VENERABLE  BODY  !  thy  origin  runs  back  to 
the  misty  ages,  far  beyond  the  reach  of  history's  pen, 
or  tradition's  tongue.  In  thy  ranks  kings  have  gladly 
taken  their  places  and  sat  them  down  with  lowly  'sub 
jects.  There  the  man  of  might  has  clasped  in  friend 
ship  the  hand  of  him  of  humblest  position  and  poorest 
means.  Thou  hast  smoothed  away  the  unevenness  of 
life  and  regarded  with  equal  favor  the  worthy  poor  and 
worthy  rich.  The  scholar,  the  philosopher,  the  man  of 
science  and  of  song,  the  mechanic,  the  laborer,  the 
merchant,  the  miner,  the  farmer,  and  the  learned  pro 
fessions,  have  all  paid  glad  tribute  to  thy  worth,  thy 
usefulness  and  thy  power.  The  great  Washington,  the 
sampler  of  all  good,  and  the  embodiment  of  all  worth, 
lived  and  died  thy  subject  and  thy  friend.  Thou  hast 
been  in  every  nation  and  clime,  and  with  a  protecting 
providence  hast  hovered  over  thy  sons.  In  peace  and 


266  CALIFORNIA    ANTHOLOGY. 

in  war  thou  hast  kept  the  noiseless  tenor  of  thy  way. 
Thy  benevolent  spirit  has  sought  the  couch  of  the  sick, 
the  bier  of  the  dead,  and  the  place  of  the  widow  and  or 
phan;  it  has  made  a  home  for  the  stranger  in  a  foreign 
land,  and  has  sent  a  friend  to  the  prisoner  in  his  cell. 
Mysterious  union  of  mingled  excellencies!  thy  founda 
tion  is  laid  in  the  profoundest  wisdom,  and  thy  corner 
stone  rests  on  immortal  principles.  We  thank  thee  that 
thou  hast  afforded  us  so  clear  a  proof  that  it  is  in  the 
power  of  man  to  found  a  union  of  brothers  that  defies 
alike  the  spirit  of  change  and  the  vicissitudes  of  time ! 

— Samuel  M.    Wilson. 

230.  WHEREVER  WE  may  go,  upon  whatever  land 
our  feet  may  rest,  there,  among  thinking  men,  we  shall 
find  a  language  which  speaks  of  faith,  hope  and  charity. 
Those  are  the  three   links  in  the  golden  cord  which 
binds  men  together  in  every  part  of  the  civilized  world. 
Even  now,  while  I  speak,  (May  15,  1861)  in  the  metropo 
lis    of   Great  Britain  a    convocation    of   our   brethren 
from   all  parts  of  the  earth   are  assembled.     Around 
their  festive  table  will  be  found   the  representatives  of 
all   races — men   from    all    climes — the    Caucasian,   the 
Mongolian,  and  Ethiopian.     When  the  Grand  Master 
of  that  convocation,  whether  he  is  a  noble,  or  of  the 
humbler  walks  of  life,  rises  at  the  head  of  the  table  and 
says,  "Together,  brethren,"  he  speaks  a  language  which 
thrills  every  breast  in  the  assembly.      It   is   the  same 
language  which  says,  "Our  country,  our  whole  country, 
and  nothing  but  our  country." — Milton  S.  Latham. 

231.  FREEMASONRY,  quietly,  unostentatiously,   un- 


FRATERNAL  SOCIETIES.  267 

obtrusively,  marches  hand  in  hand  with  civilization. 
When  the  first  flag  of  our  country  was  reared  upon  the 
Pacific  Coast,  our  own  banner  floated  in  a  mystic  union 
with  it,  and  patriots  and  masons  struck  hands  together 
in  the  good  work  of  perpetuating  human  liberty,  and 
alleviating  human  suffering.  I  thank  "God — and  I  say 
it  with  all  the  reverence  due  from  the  creature  to  the 
Creator — that  there  is  one  spot  upon  this  green  earth 
where  we  can  all  meet  and  all  kneel  around  the  same 
altar  to  offer  up  our  devotions  to  the  same  ever-living 
God.  There  no  envy,  no  strife,  no  discord,  is  ever 
permitted  to  enter.  The  humblest  citizen  in  the  land, 
if  he  be  honest,  true  and  faithful,  and  meet,  the  require 
ments  of  our  order,  stands  upon  the  same  level  with  the 
chief  magistrate  of  the  commonwealth — aye,  or  a  king 
with  a  crown  upon  his  brow.  No  tests  of  nationality 
are  known  among  us;  but,  one  band  of  brothers,  our 
mission  is  that  of  peace  and  good-will,  and,  though  the 
sections  of  our  common  country  should  be  arrayed 
against  each  other,  bayonets  bristle,  military  commands 
resound,  swords  gleam  in  the  sunlight,  and  every  patriot 
stand  appalled,  yet  even  the  awful  aspect  of  these 
things  could  not  turn  the  heart  of  one  brother  mason 
against  another. — N.  Greene  Curtis. 

232.  I  WEAR  my  badge  of  masonry  with  pride 
and  exultation.  I  know,  as  I  pass  along  the  streets, 
that  men  unknown  to  me,  look  kindly  upon  me  because 
I  am  one  of  them.  I  know  that  I  have  no  need  of  a 
long  acquaintance  before  my  brother  trusts  in  me,  con 
fides  his  dearest  interests  and  his  most  intimate  secrets 


268  CALIFORNIA    ANTHOLOGY. 

to  me.  I  know  that  the  sunlight,  as  it  is  reflected  from 
my  masonic  symbol,  carries  back  with  it  a  ray  of  sym 
pathy  and  mutual  understanding  to  the  hearts  of  thous 
ands;  and  it  is  for  that  I  value  and  love  it.  But  if  this 
badge  stands  merely  by  itself,  a  piece  of  lettered  gold; 
if  there  is  no  great  meaning  symbolized  by  it ;  if  the 
fundamental  law  of  masonry  ceases  to  exist,  whereby 
the  doctrine  of  love  to  man  and  confidence  in  the 
goodness  of  his  character,  is  inculcated  as  a  precept  J 
or  if  that  becomes  a  dead  letter — if  it  is  not  carried  out 
in  our  lives  and  in  the  habits  of  our  minds — what  care 
I  for  the  bauble  ?  I  wear  it  now,  and  feel  myself 
stronger  and  better  because  I  am  permitted  to  do  so. 
Strip  it  of  its  idea,  and  I  can  only  wear  it  from  mere 
vanity. — John  B.  Felton. 

233.  No  MAN  can  ever  be  a  mason  at  heart,  unless 
he  worships  God,  and  loves  his  neighbor.  No  charla 
tan,  no  hypocrite,  no  drunkard,  no  spendthrift,  no  glut 
ton,  no  adulterer,  no  miser,  no  man  who  does  not  aspire 
and  labor  to  obey  the  moral  law,  can  ever  become  a 
mason  through  any  process  of  admission.  Perfection  in 
this  life  we  cannot  attain,  but  we  can  reach  towards  it 
with  faithful  hearts  and  steady  eyes.  Be  it  our  task, 
amidst  the  teeming  vitality  of  the  Pacific  Coast,  among 
the  race  to  which  we  belong,  under  the  institutions  by 
which  we  are  protected  in  the  spheres  of  labor  to  which 
we  are  respectively  called,  not  merely  on  holy  days  but 
every  day,  by  the  cheerfulness  and  persistence  of  our 
industry,  by  the  modesty  of  our  pretensions,  by  the 
promptness  and  punctuality  with  which  we  keep  our 
engagements,  by  the  general  probity  of  our  conduct, 


FRATERNAL    SOCIETIES.  2G9 

by  our  firmness  and  patience  under  afflictions,  by  our 
unaffected  sympathy  and  charity,  by  our  strong  control 
over  appetite  and  passion,  and  by  our  temperate  enjoy 
ment  of  pleasure,  to  spread  the  light  and  warmth  of 
Masonry. — Henry  E.  Highton. 

234.  OUR  BROTHERHOOD  operating  in  lodges  of 
labor,  and  extending  through  all  lands,  builded  many 
of  the  noblest  structures  of  the  middle  ages.  Free 
masonry  was  in  those  days  of  violence  the  ally  of  re 
ligion,  and  assisted  the  Church  to  represent  in  forms  of 
enduring  beauty  and  grandeur  the  sublime  hopes  of  the 
soul  aspiring  to  God  and  immortal  life.  Freemasonry, 
however,  achieved  its  grandest  triumph  when,  organized 
and  directed  by  the  wisdom  of  Israel's  King,  it  erected 
the  first  temple  on  the  sacred  mount.  No  discordant 
sound  of  metal  was  heard  in  its  walls;  towers  and  pin 
nacles  arose  into  the  air  like  an  embodied  dream  of 
loveliness.  During  seven  years  the  work  continued 
beneath  the  cloudless  skies  of  Palestine.  When  at 
length  the  purple  glories  of  departing  day  were  re 
flected  from  its  dome,  he  who  beheld  that  vision  might 
well  exclaim: 

"A  star  is  trembling  on  the  horizon's  verge; 
That  star  shall  glow  and  broaden  on  the  night 
Until  it  hangs  divine  and  beautiful 
In  the  proud  zenith." 

Our  Fraternity  has  ceased  to  be  an  operative  institu 
tion.  The  implements  of  the  craft  are  no  longer  em 
ployed  in  actual  labor.  They  have  become  symbols 
of  speculative  truth,  and  speak  to  the  mind  of  laws  and 

18 


a270  CALIFORNIA    ANTHOLOGY. 

X  I 

•duties  the  observance  of  which  will  render  our  lives 
pure  and  harmonious,  and  our  characters  ftrm  and  sym 
metrical.  We  may  not  regret  the  change.  It  was  a 
modification  demanded  by  the  progress  of  civilization 
and  the  improved  conditions  of  society.  Throughout 
the  world  Masonry  is  to-day  doing  a  nobler  work  than 
when  its  Ancient  Craftsmen  builded  their  stateliest  col 
umns.  The  Masonic  institution  itself  is  more  wonder 
ful  than  any  edifice  which  it  ever  constructed  from  the 
perishable  materials  of  earth.  It  has  an  unspoken 
language  older  than  any  living  language  of  Christen 
dom.  It  has  survived  wars  and  revolutions,  and  is  now 
silently  ascending  to  loftier  planes  of  usefulness.  It 
looks  to  the  heavens  for  its  model,  and  in  its  work 
imitates  the  Divine  plan  of  nature.  The  Sun  draws  in 
vapory  tributes  the  moisture  from  the  ocean;  the  invisi 
ble  winds  carry  it  in  clouds  over  the  globe  and  distribute 
in  refreshing  showers  the  liquid  treasures  of  the  skies. 
In  like  manner  Masonry  draws  its  strength  and  re 
sources  from  the  deep  sea  of  human  sympathies,  and 
employs  them  to  redress  the  wrongs  and  relieve  the 
sorrows  of  humanity. — Frank  Tilford. 

235.  A  LOVE  OF  TRUTH,  with  the  practice  of  it  in 
every  relation  of  life,  is  the  supreme  virtue  of  Masonry. 
At  each  stage  of  his  advancement  the  neophyte  is 
reminded  that  "  the  first  creature  of  Cod,  in  the  works 
of  the  days,  was  the  light  of  the  senses;  the  last  was 
the  light  of  reason;  and  his  Sabbath  work  ever  since 
then  is  the  illumination  of  his  spirit."  He  learns  that 
the  oracles  of  truth  are  the  inspiration  of  the  Deity, 


FRATERNAL    SOCIETIES.  271 

and  in  their  very  nature  eternal  and  immutable.  He 
sees  the  glowing  fancies  of  youth  dissolve  in  the  clear 
light  of  experience,  the  passions  expire  in  the  flames 
they  excite,  and  the  strength  of  manhood  vanish  amid 
the  infirmities  of  age,  while  truth  alone  defies  the 
power  of  time  and  decay.  Allied  to  the  noblest  of 
virtues,  are  the  discipline  of  the  mind,  the  subjection  of 
the  emotions  to  the  dominion  of  reason,  and  the  attain 
ment  of  knowledge.  The  character  of  the  period  in 
which  we  live  unites  with  the  precepts  of  the  Order, 
and  invites  us  to  enter  the  wide,  the  boundless  fields  of 
science. 

The  nineteenth  century  has  been  styled  an  age  of 
transition.  It  deserves  the  appellation.  Since  its  com 
mencement  waves  of  thought  have  rolled  over  the 
nations  with  a  volume  ever  increasing,  and  in  tides  that 
never  recede.  The  resistless  movement  carries  society 
each  revolving  year  further  from  ancient  landmarks  and 
systems  of  philosophy  fast  sinking  into  oblivion.  In 
the  application  of  scientific  principles  to  natural  forces; 
in  discoveries  and  inventions  which  have  wrought 
important  changes  in  all  the  relations  of  the  civilized 
world,  and  in  the  emancipation  of  the  human  reason 
from  a  thraldom  which  forbade  any  inquiry  except  in 
conformity  to  certain  prescribed  theories,  the  nineteenth 
century  claims  its  splendid  and  enduring  triumphs.  In 
the  lifetime  of  the  present  generation,  science  has 
launched  the  steamship  on  the  trackless  ocean,  and 
impelled  it  forward  against  warring  billows  and  oppos 
ing  winds;  has  painted  with  the  sunbeam,  and  made 
the  subtle  currents  of  electricity — invisible  yet  unerring 


272  CALIFORNIA    ANTHOLOGY. 

— carriers  of  thought.  It  has  descended  into  the  dark 
chambers  of  the  earth  and  exhumed  treasures  of  gold 
and  silver,  surpassing  in  value  all  that  men  had  gathered 
during  previous  centuries  of  civilization.  Leaving  the 
peaceful  vocations  of  industry,  and  devoting  its  re 
sources  to  the  work  of  destroying  life,  science  has 
forged  engines  of  death  more  potent  than  the  wildest 
dreams  of  imagination  ever  before  conceived.  It  has 
swept  with  sublime  confidence  down  the  abyss  of  time, 
and,  traversing  the  countless  ages  of  the  past,  presents 
to  the  vision  no  uncertain  pictures  of  the  world  from 
creation's  dawn  to  the  present  hour.  It  exhibits  the 
earth  as  a  vast  sepulchre  in  which  are  burried  the  forms 
of  life  that  have  perished.  As  one  generation  was 
about  to  expire,  the  creative  energy  of  nature  evolved 
from  it  another  and  higher  class  of  existence.  Thus,, 
through  successive  epochs,  we  behold  a  series  of  phe 
nomena,  governed  by  harmonious  laws,  and  evincing  a 
complete  unity  of  design.  Science  ascends  with  its 
torch  to  the  skies,  surveys  the  celestial  worlds,  defines 
their  appointed  courses,  and  discovers  the  very  elements 
of  which  they  are  composed.  It  points  to  Alcyone  in. 
the  constellation  of  the  Pleiades,  and  demonstrates  that 
it  is  a  grand  central  sun,  encircled  by  the  universe  of 
stars,  forming  our  astral  system.  Around  that  resplen 
dent  orb,  our  sun,  with  his  satellites,  revolves  in  an. 
orbit  so  vast  that  eighteen  million  two  hundred  thous 
and  years  must  elapse  before  one  revolution  is  com 
pleted. 

Thus  it  is  evident  that  no  association,  however  an 
cient  or  benevolent,  can  exert  an  appreciable  influence 


FRATERNAL  SOCIETIES.  273 

unless  it  calls  to  its  aid  educated  intellect  and  the  re 
sources  of  knowledge.  It  becomes  the  duty,  as  it  is 
manifestly  the  interest,  of  the  Masonic  Fraternity,  to 
revive  in  its  lodges  that  devotion  to  the  liberal  arts 
and  sciences  which  constituted,  in  the  medieval  cen 
turies  in  Europe,  the  attraction  of  Masonry.  Chief 
among  the  instrumentalities  needed  to  accomplish  this 
noble  object  are  Masonic  libraries.  Every  lodge  should 
have  a  collection  of  literary  and  scientific  works; 
lectures  should  be  encouraged,  a*nd  members  incited  to 
prosecute  with  order  studies  appropriate  to  their  tastes 
and  pursuits  in  life.  After  contemplating  what  the 
genius  and  learning  of  man  have  accomplished,  the 
mind  naturally  seeks  the  immortal  source  of  all  intelli 
gence.  A  cardinal  tenet  of  Masonry  is  a  belief  in  the 
existence  of  a  Supreme  Ruler  of  the  universe,  and,  as 
a  corollary  to  that  sublime  truth,  faith  in  the  immortality 
of  the  soul.  It  teaches  us  that  the  ineffable  spirit  of 
wisdom  and  love  animates  and  permeates  all  time  and 
space.  The  soul  discerns  His  presence  in  every  form 
of  being  and  every  manifestation  of  nature;  in  the 
morning  and  the  evening;  in  the  Spring,  with  its  re 
freshing  showers,  and  the  Autumn,  with  its  rich  sheaves 
and  golden  harvests;  in  the  forest,  with  their  infinite 
variety  of  flower  and  foliage;  in  the  mountains  that 
lift  their  hoary  heads  above  the  clouds;  in  the  rivulets 
that  sparkle  in  the  sunlight;  and  in  the  seas  that  mir 
ror  the  glory  of  the  skies.  Atheism  may  spread  far 
and  wide,  shutting  out  from  the  soul  the  hope  of 
immortality,  but  while  the  Masonic  Order  continues  a 
power  on  earth,  faith  will  find  a  sanctuary  in  its  temples. 


274  CALIFORNIA   ANTHOLOGY. 

Masonry  is  a  recognition  of  the  equality  of  man,  and 
of  the  fraternal  obligations  which  bind  all  men  together. 
It  is  the  highest  expression  of  the  sentiment  of  uni 
versal  brotherhood.  Within  its  portals  there  is  no  dis 
tinction  of  lineage  or  caste.  The  hereditary  ruler  of  an 
empire ;  the  scholar  whose  researches  extend  over  all 
the  realms  of  thought;  the  soldier,  bearing  on  his  per 
son  the  glittering  trophies  of  a  hundred  victories;  the 
owner  of  untold  riches,  and  the  laboring  man,  whose 
ill-requited  toil  earns  for  himself  a  meagre  livelihood, 
are  all  alike — brethren  all. 

While  rank  and  wealth  divide  society  into  classes; 
while  political  and  religious  differences  create  animosi 
ties,  Masonry  speaks  a  universal  language  which  all 
men  understand,  and  occupies  a  platform  broad  enough 
and  firm  enough  for  all  the  world.  It  violates  no  law. 
It  wars  with  no  sect,  party  or  State.  It  obeys  literally 
the  divine  admonition:  "Let  not  thy  left  hand  know 
what  thy  right  hand  doeth,"  and  performs  in  secret  the 
holy  offices  of  charity.  Wherever  sin  and  wrong  have 
cast  their  dark  shadow,  there  is  Masonry,  to  reclaim  the 
erring  and  lead  the  repentant  again  to  paths  of  peace. 
Wherever  are  sickness  and  sorrow,  there  is  Masonry,  to 
watch  and  soothe;  wherever  is  death,  there  is  Masonry, 
to  commit,  with  solemn  rites,  the  lifeless  form  to  the 
silence  of  the  grave. 

There  is  no  eternity  to  matter.  No  work  of  man  can 
resist  the  ruthless  hand  of  violence  or  the  unsparing 
scythe  of  time.  Even  the  temple  which  our  ancient 
Craftsmen  erected  on  the  sacred  mountain,  that  marvel- 


FRATERNAL    SOCIETIES.  275 

ous  structure  of  consummate  beauty,  has  not  escaped 
the  universal  doom.  Note  the  changes  wrought  on 
our  planet  since  the  era  of  authentic  history. 

Science  reveals  to  us  the  unchangeable  decree  of  the 
Infinite  that  the  time  must  arrive,  in  the  grand  proces 
sion  of  the  ages,  when  all  life  shall  cease  upon  our 
globe.  The  atmosphere,  with  its  gorgeous  hues  and 
banners  of  clouds,  will  pass  away;  the  rivers  and  oceans 
will  disappear;  the  myriad  voices  of  nature  will  no 
longer  arise  to  the  heavens  in  songs  of  rejoicing,  and 
the  mighty  monuments  of  the  past  will  remain,  tombs 
of  generations  that  have  died  amid  the  awful  solitudes 
of  a  dead  world;  but  the  principles  of  Masonry  cannot 
die.  They  must  survive.  They  are  rays  from  the 
eternal  light,  drops  from  the  river  of  everlasting  life, 
and,  like  their  deathless  original,  they  too  possess  the 
attribute  of  immortality. 

Oh,  Masonry!  with  origin  vested  in  mystery,  yet 
whose  pathway  is  luminous  with  the  love  of  humanity; 
whose  life  is  the  spirit  of  ever- working  benevolence; 
whose  mission  is  the  divinest  charity;  may  thy  stand 
ards  advance,  thy  temples  rise,  until  Truth,  Justice, 
Faith,  Charity,  and  Fraternal  Love  encompass  with  their 
holy  influences  all  tribes  and  nations. — Frank  Tilford. 


ODD  FELLOWSHIP. 

236.  With  the  weaving  force  of  the  material  mes 
sengers  of  man,  latest  brought  under  his  dominion,  we 
may  name  again  a  more  certain  agent  in  cementing  the 


276  CALIFORNIA    ANTHOLOGY. 

ties  of  common  nationality — the  correspondence,  the 
contact,  and  the  council  of  conversation,  of  brethren  in 
the  Order  of  Odd  Fellowship  throughout  the  United 
States  of  America. 

In  a  beautiful  city  at  the  head  of  a  magnificent  bay 
there  scands  a  monument  to  the  Father  of  our  Country. 
It  is  a  companion  shaft  for  the  granite  column  that 
marks  the  spot  where  the  first  real  battle  of  the  revolu 
tion  was  fought — on  the  hights  of  Bunker  Hill.  Every 
intelligent  American  who  is  a  visitor  in  the  city  of 
Baltimore,  feels  it  to  be  the  duty  of  a  grateful  citizen— 
as  well  as  a  privilege  of  pride — to  ascend  the  Washing 
ton  column,  and  take  the  inspiration  of  patriotism  anew 
from  its  lofty  summit.  In  that  same  metropolis  there 
is  a  far  more  humble  monument,  reared  by  the  Order 
of  Odd  Fellowship  a  few  short  years  ago.  And  while 
the  spirit  of  reverential  memory  is  glowing  within  us, 
we  turn  from  the  towering  obelisk  to  the  simple  pile  of 
granite,  and  feel  that  we  do  no  injustice  to  the  mightier 
shades  when  we  give  an  hour  of  affectionate  recollection 
and  homage  before  the  tablets  which  speak  of  Wildey's 
fame.  We  read  of  a  great,  honest  sympathy,  and  a 
zeal  according  to  knowledge  in  the  imparting  and 
adapting  of  fraternal  rules  for  the  alleviation  of  human 
suffering  and  the  promotion  of  heathful  social  enjoy 
ments.  Who  is  he  that  has  contributed  most  in  all  this 
land  for  the  superadding  of  friendship's  glorious  bonds 
to  the  responsive  claim  of  citizenship  ?  \Ve  take  noth 
ing  from  other  and  more  intellectual  and  more  demon 
strative  captains  of  the  age,  when  from  immediate 
communication  with  their  record  we  pass  with  a  full 


FRATERNAL    SOCIETIES.  277 

consciousness  of  equal  if  not  more  deserving  worth  to- 
the  central  altar  of  Thomas  Wildey.  And  when  we 
purchase  from  the  bare-footed  flower  boy,  a  bouquet  of 
ever-greens  and  roses,  and  lay  it  upon  the  foundation 
blocks  of  his  modest  but  elegant  monument,  we  think 
we  have  paid  no  vain  tribute  to  the  memory  of  a  mor 
tal  man,  but  by  the  simplest  token  have  recognized  a 
service  whose  beneficence  we  have  felt  a  thousand 
times;  and  which  shall  not  be  stayed  in  its  rising  wave 
until  the  tears  and  woes  of  this  world  are  submerged 
in  the  healing  tide  which  shall  flow  from  the  fountain 
of  benevolence  and  peace.  One  sprig  of  the  tena 
cious  cypress  that  is  bound  in  a  votive  cluster  we  de 
tach  with  trembling  hand,  and  lay  between  the  leaves 
of  a  pocket  manual  of  our  Order.  We  will  take  that 
with  us  across  the  great  continent ;  and  in  another 
great  city,  in  the  same  latitude,  by  the  side  of  another 
ocean,  we  will  place  the  frail  fragment  upon  the  sod 
beside  another  monument, — which  stands  above  the 
grave  of  SAMUEL  PARKER. — Charles  A.  Sumner. 

237.  ODD  FELLOWSHIP  disregards  the  factitious 
distinctions  in  society  which  wealth  and  station  have 
created,  and  requires  personal  worth  and  moral  char 
acter  as  the  only  passport  to  its  privileges  and  protec 
tion.  It  goes  beyond  the  mere  physical  wants  of  man 
and  proposes  an  expansion  of  the  human  sympathies. 
It  ignores  the  tottering,  palsied  steps  of  superannuated 
antiquity,  and  grapples,  with  all  the  ardor  of  youth,  the 
pressing  duties  of  life  and  the  realities  of  modern  pro 
gress.  It  seeks  to  enlighten  and  educate  the  mind  of 


278  CALIFORNIA    ANTHOLOGY. 

man  and  enlarge  the  sphere  of  his  affection. — George 
R.  Moore. 

238.  OUR  ORDER  represents,  perhaps  in  a  greater 
degree  than  any  other  institution,  the  principle  of  mu 
tual  assistance,  by  which  society  can  be  reclaimed. 
The  rich  man  would  not  seek  it  to  increase  his  riches, 
the  learned  man  his  learning,  or  the  great  man  his  power; 
it  commends  itself  to  that  great  body  of  common  men 
who  bear  life's  burthens  and  responsibilities,  and  who 
sometimes  grow  weary  with  the  load.  It  commands 
its  disciples  to  counsel  each  other  in  health,  to  assist 
each  other  in  difficulty,  to  defend  each  other  in  danger, 
to  relieve  each  other  in  sickness,  and  when  one  falls  in 
the  ranks,  to  watch  over  and  protect  the  objects  of  his 
love,  whom  he  leaves  helpless  behind  him.  But  these 
ministrations  are  only  a  tithe  of  its  virtues.  It  seeks 
to  improve  and  elevate  the  character  of  man,  to  en 
lighten  his  mind,  to  enlarge  the  sphere  of  his  affection- 
Associated  together,  we  can  have  schools,  libraries  and 
cabinets.  In  the  charmed  circle  where  we  meet  want 
must  never  come — the  fear  of  it  must  be  banished. 
Here  must  be  diffused  around  all  the  healthful  atmos 
phere  of  conscious  independence.  Meeting  together 
frequently  in  our  lodges,  mind  shall  shape  mind,  intel 
lect  strengthen  intellect.  Surrounded  by  emblems  and 
symbols,  and  listening  to  the  teachings  of  the  good,  we 
can  keep  alive  in  our  hearts  the  sense  of  the  beautiful 
and  love  of  the  true.  Our  institution  is  a  model  State, 
whose  laws  are  founded  upon  justice,  administered  in 
love,  and  whose  only  sanction  is  honor.  We  will 


FRATERNAL    SOCIETIES.  279 

earnestly  but  peacefully  strive  to  inaugurate  the  era  of 
social  democracy,  wherein  labor  will  be  endowed  with 
the  privileges  it  establishes  and  enriched  with  the  bless 
ings  it  creates. — Newton  Booth. 

239.  I  SHOULD  deem  that  I  chased  shadows  were  I 
to  recur  to  the  forgotten  slanders  of  the  past,  or  dwell 
upon    the    feeble    objections   that   a    few  yet  present 
against  Odd  Fellowship.     The  world  of  to-day  is  too 
enlightened  to  embark  in  or  encourage  a  crusade  against 
a  body  of  men  against  whom  no  evil  can  be  proven — 
whose  professed  principles  are  pure,  and  whose  acts,  so 
far  as  they  are  open  to  scrutiny,  are  uniformly  charac 
terized  by  earnest  and  self-sacrificing  benevolence.  We 
stand  not  now  upon  the  defensive.     Our  enemies  have 
retired  before  our   advancing  hosts,   their  weapons  of 
assault  broken,  their  champions  in   the  dust,   and  we 
are  no  longer  molested  in  the  great  and  glorious  work 
of  uplifting  the  city  and   temple  of  Odd  Fellowship. 
May  the  work,  so  nobly  begun,  and    so   successfully 
prosecuted,  go  on,   until   ics    foundations  encircle  the 
earth,  till  its  lofty  spires   reach  the   heavens,  catching 
the  first  rays  of  the  rising  sun,  and  flashing  back  its 
beams  till  the  last  moment  of  time.      May  the  millions 
of  the  future    be  numbered  in  its  brotherhood,  catch 
the  inspiration  of  its  free  spirit,  and  forever  transmit  in 
their  integrity  the  cardinal  tenets  of  Friendship,  Love 
and  Truth. — A.  A.  Sargent. 

240.  ODD  FELLOWSHIP,  in  its  practical  application 
to  its  own  membership,  is  human  fellowship.    Ignoring  in 


280  CALIFORNIA    ANTHOLOGY. 

this  fellowship  all  political  and  ecclesiastical  distinctions, 
all  the  caste  classifications  of  human  society,  this  Order 
plants  itself  distinctly  upon  the  brotherhood  of  man  and 
the  fatherhood  of  God.  Its  organization  is  designed  for 
efficiency — designed  to  give  efficiency  to  its  charitable 
purposes.  It  is  not  founded  upon  any  Utopian  theory  of 
what  may  be  at  some  remote  period  in  the  future,  but 
upon  the  every-day  character  of  man  at  the  present 
time.  Its  government  is  neither  a  democracy,  republic 
nor  aristocracy,  but  has  enough  of  each  to  prevent  cen 
tral  despotism  or  popular  insubordination.  Its  mission 
is  one  of  charity.  It  aims  to  cultivate  the  holy  princi 
ples  of  friendship,  love  and  truth,  yet  it  tolerates  neither 
insubordination  nor  trifling  on  the  part  of  its  member 
ship.  Its  present  government  did  not  spring  forth  per 
fect  by  one  elastic  bound,  as  Minerva  from  the  head  of 
Jupiter,  but  is  the  product  of  long  and  trying  experi 
ence.  Its  trials  have  been  numerous,  often  threatening 
its  authority,  and  sometimes  its  very  existence;  but 
these  have  imparted  to  it  strength,  and  fitted  it  for  its 
great  mission.  Before  its  altars  the  rich  and  poor  alike, 
the  learned  and  the  unlearned,  the  high  and  the  low, 
stand  upon  a  common  platform.  All  contribute  alike 
to  swell  its  common  treasury,  and  in  sickness,  all,  rich 
or  poor,  draw  alike  from  the  same  general  fountain,  not 
as  a  charity,  but  as  a  right,  growing  out  of  membership. 
The  Lodge  is  a  school-room  for  moral  and  intellectual 
training — for  keeping  the  mind  clear  and  active,  and 
the  spirit  polished,  that  it  may  the  more  easily  slide  in 
fraternal  grooves.  Is  it  of  no  advantage  to  the  growth 
of  the  human  soul  to  have  the  wants  of  the  sick  and 


FRATERNAL    SOCIETIES.  281 

the  claims  of  the  dying,  the  necessities  of  the  widow 
and  orphan  weekly,  daily,  hourly,  brought  before  it? 
Odd  Fellowship  is  now  deeply  rooted  in  American  soil. 
Its  beneficial  influence  cannot  be  confined  within  the 
circle  of  the  Order — it  permeates  the  entire  social  state. 
With  its  own  elevation  it  lifts  up  society. — Gen.  John 
A.  Collins. 

241.  WHEN  WE  look  around  to  see  what  occupies 
and  interests  the  nation,  we  find  political  parties,  with 
their  various  schemes  of  internal  improvement,  banks 
and  tariffs,  public  schools,  colleges,  asylums,  railroad 
corporations,  steamship  companies,  Masonry,  Odd  Fel 
lowship  and  the  church.  These  constitute  the  nation's 
life,  and  upon  them  are  expended  its  best  energies;  but 
they  are  not  all  equally  lasting.  The  institution  we 
strove  the  hardest  to  maintain,  the  party  we  deemed 
most  essential  to  the  prosperity  of  our  country,  has 
vanished.  Wrhere  is  the  old  Whig  party  of  Webster 
and  Clay  ?  Where  is  the  Democracy  of  Jefferson  and 
Jackson  ?  Shivered  like  glass.  The  Republic  itself 
has  shaken  from  foundation  to  dome.  While  we  look, 
the  object  is  gone.  While  the  warm  words  of  the 
orator  ring  in  our  ears,  the  institution  he  praised  has 
flitted  away;  but  there  is  always  something  left.  Not 
all  of  the  supposed  pillars  of  the  nation  at  any  one  time 
fill,  and  our  aim  is  to  learn  which  of  the  institutions  of 
a  given  age  are  things  of  a  night,  to  float  like  a  dream 
on  the  surface  of  society,  and  which,  with  their  corner 
stones  on  the  bedrock  of  national  life,  are  destined  to 
live. 


282  CALIFORNIA    ANTHOLOGY. 

The  true  test  of  the  permanence  of  any  institution  is 
this:  "  Does  it  rest  upon  the  great  law  that  man  is  the 
child  of  God  and  the  brother  of  man?"  In  proportion 
as  it  recognizes  and  enforces  this  law,  in  that  proportion 
is  it  one  of  those  great  institutions  which  give  life  and 
power  to  a  nation — swallowing  up  all  lesser  measures 
and  reforms,  or  moulding  them  into  shape,  and  impart 
ing  to  them  whatever  of  vitality  they  possess;  flourish 
ing  when  they  decay,  and  living  green  when  they  are 
covered  thick  with  the  moss  of  the  tomb.  When, 
therefore,  we  commit  ourselves  to  parties,  or  sects,  or 
institutions,  let  us  remember  that  some  are  to  go  out 
like  a  taper,  or,  at  most,  to  live  for  a  generation.  On 
these  let  us  not  waste  our  time  or  substance,  for  their 
very  name  shall  be  blotted  out  ere  the  sod  has  settled 
on  your  grave.  Oh !  man,  Oh !  woman,  take  care  lest 
the  shrine  at  which  you  worship  be  a  whited  sepulchre, 
full  of  dead  men's  bones ! 

Assuming  that  the  test  of  the  real  virtue  of  institu 
tions  is  the  degree  in  which  they  recognize  the  truth 
that  there  is  one  God,  and  He  our  Father,  and  that  all 
•  men  are  brothers,  how  shall  it  be  decided  whether  a 
particular  institution  does  recognize  this  truth,  and 
hence  whether  Odd  Fellowship  stands  the  test !  One 
of  the  most  difficult  problems  to  solve  is  whether  a 
given  institution,  potent  in  its  sway  over  the  age,  be 
in  fact  built  upon  that  eternal  law,  written  upon  the 
heavens  and  earth,  that  God  rules  and  that  all  men  are 
brothers.  Odd  Fellowship  has  no  other  origin 

than  the  big  hearts  of  the  mass  of  men.  To  cheer 
each  other  in  the  toils  of  life,  to  aid  each  other  in 


FRATERNAL    SOCIETIES.  283 

sickness  and  distress,  and  to  bury  the  dead,  were  the 
objects  of  its  founders.  Gradually  the  sphere  of  the 
institution  became  so  enlarged  as  to  embrace  the  widow, 
and  the  orphan ;  and  finally  it  assumed  its  present 
noble  proportions,  not  only  to  aid  in  distress,  but  to 
enlighten  the  mind  and  expand  the  heart.  Its  funda 
mental  idea  being  that  man  is  the  brother  of  man,  and 
hence  his  equal,  its  constant  tendency  is  to  take  man's 
thoughts  from  self  and  direct  them  to  his  fellow  men, 
and  thus  to  bring  within  the  scope  of  his  daily  medita 
tions  millions  of  human  beings  instead  of  one  *  * 
Friend,  brother !  the  man  who  rises  from  such  medita 
tions  rises  a  nobler  man.  What  a  noble  principle !  Im 
plant  it  in  the  heart  of  every  man  in  the  State,  and  you 
have  a  whole  people  animated  by  one  great  thought— 
the  learned  sharing  their  knowledge  with  the  unlearned 
— the  rich  spreading  out  an  open  purse  to  the  poor — 
each  breathing  into  the  other's  ear  his  struggles,  his 
hopes,  and  his  fears.  A  State  so  constituted  would 
be  a  glory  in  peace,  a  terror  in  war. 

America  boasts  that  she  is  a  watch-tower  of  liberty 
— that  here  the  portals  of  freedom's  temple  ever  swing 
wide  open.  Odd  Fellowship  stands  around  republican 
institutions  a  wall  of  fire  against  their  enemies;  and  if 
ever  the  stately  columns  of  this  republic  crumble  and 
go  down  amid  the  billows,  and  the  darkness  of  despot 
ism  settles  upon  the  land — then,  if  there  be  any  hope 
—if  there  be  a  single  gleam  of  light, — the  sentinels  of 
Odd  Fellowship  will  be  there  upon  the  outer  wall  as  in 
the  olden  time,  and  to  the  anxious  question,  "  Watch- 


284  CALIFORNIA    ANTHOLOGY. 

man,  what  of  the  night  ?  "  will  cry  out,  "  The  morning 
cometh. "--John  B.  Harmon. 

242.  THE  ADMIRERS  OF  ANTIQUITY  have  toiled  to 
discover  the  land-marks  of  Odd  Fellowship  far  back 
amid  the  mysterious  realms  of  the  past.  Impressed 
with  the  beauty  and  simplicity  of  its  morals  and  phil 
osophy,  they  would  teach  us  to  believe  it  has  been  gar 
nished  and  enriched  by  the  noblest  intellects  of  all  time. 
Through  the  dim  vista  of  cycles  lost,  amid  the  moulder 
ing  monuments  of  ancient  empires,  they  trace  its  fabu 
lous  history,  ever  struggling  to  embellish  and  perfect 
its  fair  proportions,  by  shedding  around  it  the  light  and 
lustre  of  primeval  grandeur  and  greatness.  In  the 
Roman  legends,  and  following  their  victorious  legions 
over  the  plains  of  Andalusia,  or  amid  the  Druidical 
oaks  of  Britain,  on  the  fields  of  Palestine,  where  fol 
lowers  of  cross  and  crescent  met  in  deadly  conflict,  in 
the  brilliant  age  of  Pericles,  amid  the  flickering  lamps 
and  solemn  mummeries  of  scholastic  cells,  they  point 
us  to  the  doubtful  evidence  of  its  existence. 

I  choose  to  reject  the  fable  of  its  ante-feudal  birth, 
and  hail  the  truth  that  the  dust  of  antiquity  has  never 
tinged  its  vestments.  No  ancient  records  tell  the  story 
of  its  praise  or  shame;  it  holds  no  key  to  unlock  the 
mysteries  of  another  age.  No  Pagan  monarch  in  pur 
ple  has  known  it,  no  holy  prophet  in  the  dim  old  wilder 
ness,  no  chosen  high  priest  of  the  Infinite  has  lifted  up 
his  incensed  hand  to  consecrate  its  forms.  But  the 
weary  and  the  fatherless,  the  distressed  and  desolate  of 
our  own  land  and  age,  have  enshrined  it  in  their  hearts 


FRATERNAL    SOCIETIES.  285 

and  blessed  it  with  prayers  and  tears.  I  choose  to  find 
its  origin  in  the  development  of  that  modern  English 
civilization  which  has  been  ever  foremost  in  all  that 
tends  to  ameliorate  the  condition  of  society,  and  im 
prove  and  perfect  the  character  of  man.  Reason  and 
philosophy  indeed  would  never  bid  you  seek  its  pres 
ence  beyond  that  period.  An  institution  like  this, 
founded  on  the  most  ennobling  truths  of  modern  reli 
gion,  proclaiming  and  vindicating  the  fraternity  of  man, 
with  the  last  and  grandest  of  the  commandments,  "Love 
ye  one  another,"  as  the  summary  of  its  faith,  would  not 
in  the  nature  of  things  rise  and  flourish  while  the  social 
distinctions  of  the  Middle  Ages  prevailed.  While 
science,  art,  literature  and  learning  were  confined  to 
the  monastic  cell ;  while  the  pall  of  barbarism  en 
shrouded  the  world,  and  the  glory  of  man  was  estimated 
by  the  thousands  he  had  slaughtered  rather  than  by  the 
good  he  had  accomplished;  the  earth  presented  but  a 
barren  field  for  the  cultivation  of  the  virtues  which 
Odd  Fellowship  inculcates.  It  required  another  and  a 
vastly  different  condition  of  society.  When  the  social 
distinctions  of  the  Middle  Ages  had  been  partially 
broken  down — crown  and  coronet  trampled  in  the 
dust — and  prince  and  peasant  taught  to  weep  and  pray 
together;  when  the  plebeian  dared  assert  that  flowers 
bloomed  for  him  as  well  as  for  the  prince,  and  that  the 
natural  elements  of  life  and  impulses  of  humanity  be 
longed  no  less  to  him  than  to  his  imperial  master;  when 
the  mariner's  compass  had  revealed  a  new  continent, 
and  the  telescope  new  worlds ;  when  the  two  great 
engines  of  civilization — war  and  commerce — had  made 

19 


"286  .  CALIFORNIA    ANTHOLOGY. 

man  better  acquainted  with  his  fellow  man  ;  and  the 
art  of  printing  had  stepped  in  to  disseminate  truth  and 
intelligence;  when  the  church,  at  last  mindful  of  her 
peaceful  mission,  was  proclaiming  the  idea  of  one  vast 
brotherhood  in  the  practice  of  virtue  and  enjoyment 
of  fraternal  love;  when  in  brief  all  antiquated  forms 
and  systems  were  dissolving  in  the  light  of  increased 
knowledge;  and  charity,  benevolence,  and  kindred  vir 
tues  were  supplanting  the  selfish  vices  of  our  ancestors 
—Odd  Fellowship  sprang  into  existence.  It  was  the 
legitimate  fruit  of  that  great  social  and  moral  transi 
tion — the  child  of  progress,  the  ward  of  civilization. 

It  has  strengthened  the  cause  of  good  government, 
by  teaching  obedience  to  law  and  respect  for  superiors, 
in  the  administration  of  its  own  internal  polity. 

It  has  built  up  a  system  of  jurisprudence,  the  counter 
part  of  the  law  of  the  land,  and  by  a  rigid  enforcement 
of  its  sanctions,  taught  at  once  the  law,  and  the  process 
and  necessity  of  its  observance. 

It  has  frowned  on  turbulence  and  strife,  and  di 
minished  the  chances  of  insurrection  and  rebellion,  by 
promptly  punishing  in  every  instance  insubordination 
in  its  own  ranks. 

It  has  built  up  the  altars  of  religion  everywhere,  by 
teaching  with  a  force  and  beauty  rarely  attained  in 
other  schools,  the  lessons  of  immortality  and  depend 
ence  on  Almighty  God. 

It  has  added  new  charms  to  the  volume  of  inspira 
tion,  by  presenting  it  as  the  fountain  head  of  its  own 


FRATERNAL    SOCIETIES.  287 

beautiful  teachings,  and  adopting  its  precepts  as  part  of 
its  own  ritual  and  lectures. 

It  has  made  religion  more  inviting,  by  making  it 
more  practical — by  compelling  its  votaries  to  do  that 
which  religion  was  satisfied  to  teach  them  they  ought 
to  do. 

It  has  taught  man  the  true  fraternal  relation,  by  im 
pressing  upon  his  mind  that  God  is  the  Common  Fa 
ther  of  All. 

It  has  promoted  temperance  and  truth,  by  keeping 
their  innate  charms  ever  before  the  mind  in  the  most 
attractive  form,  and  promptly  punishing  every  departure 
from  their  principles,  or  violation  of  their  requirements. 

It  has  established  a  new  bond  of  unity  among  men, 
and  by  its  agency  settled  and  adjusted  peacefully  the 
thousand  difficulties,  which  otherwise  violence  and  strife 
would  have  made  perpetual. 

It  has  made  man  more  just  and  upright,  by  making 
him  more  confident  of  the  justice  and  integrity  of  his 
fellow-man. 

It  has  gilded  Charity  with  additional  charms;  and, 
rearing  her  altars  at  every  fireside,  has  widened  the 
field  of  her  ministrations,  and  multiplied  her  servants. 

It  has  broken  down  the  artificial  distinctions  of  so 
ciety,  which  mere  wealth  had  reared,  by  compelling  its 
followers  to  meet  on  the  same  level  and  recognize  merit 
as  the  only  passport  to  preferment. 

It  has  infused  the  masses  with  a  common  sympathy 
and  aspiration,  by  bringing  them  together  in  interchange 


288  CALIFORNIA    ANTHOLOGY. 

of  thought  and  wish,  and  uniting  their  efforts  for  the 
accomplishment  of  a  common  purpose. 

It  has  made  man  better,  by  compelling  him  to  be  a 
perpetual  witness  to  its  deeds  of  kindness  and  good 
will,  and  laying  on  his  heart  the  thanks  and  benedictions 
of  those  who  have  experienced  his  friendly  offices. 

It  has  stifled  resentments  and  stayed  the  passion  of 
revenge,  by  pointing,  with  unerring  certainty,  to  a 
speedy  remedy  for  every  wrong,  a  voluntary  atonement 
for  every  injury  and  insult. 

It  has  cheered  the  poor  and  unfortunate,  kept  from 
the  heart  the  demon  of  despair,  from  the  brain  madness, 
and  stricken  down  the  suicidal  hand  by  providing  that 
timely  aid  which  could  be  supplied  from  no  other 
source,  and  pointing  to  a  future  full  of  hope  and  joy. 

It  has  promoted  the  cause  of  education,  by  founding- 
schools  and  libraries,  to  which  the  friendless  orphan 
gains  as  ready  admission  as  the  son  of  luxury  and 
wealth. 

It  has  conserved  morality,  by  banishing  the  hard 
necessities  which  drive  men  into  crime — by  keeping  out 
from  thousands  of  homes  the  spectre  of  famine,  and 
casting  around  its  altars  the  allurements  which  lead  the 
young  and  giddy  up  from  the  play-house  and  saloon  to 
the  more  refined  and  virtuous  enjoyments  of  the  lodge 
room. 

*  It  has  fitted  young  men  for  the  struggles  of  life,  by 
familiarizing  them  with  the  forms  of  business  and  de 
bate,  and  sending  them  out  on  missions  at  once,  most 
arduous  and  delicate. 


FRATERNAL    SOCIETIES.  289 

It  has  made  them  independent,  self-reliant  and  self- 
respectful,  and  developed  them  into  earlier  manhood, 
by  charging  them  with  grave  responsibilities  and  the 
consideration  and  decision  of  the  most  serious  and 
complex  propositions. 

It  has  made  man  more  thoughtful  of  the  future,  more 
attentive  to  his  present  duties,  more  considerate  to 
wards  his  fellow-men,  and  more  solicitous  for  his  own 
ultimate  destiny,  by  requiring  him,  as  often  as  the  grim 
messenger  invades  the  Lodge,  to  join  the  funeral  pro 
cession  to  the  Silent  City,  and  there  contemplate  the 
solemn  lessons  of  mortality. — Leonidas  E.  Pratt. 


THE  IMPROVED  ORDER  OF  RED  MEN. 

243.  The  Improved  Order  of  Red  Men  is  the  off 
spring  of  love  of  country,  of  fortitude,  and  of  self-sacrifice. 
It  is  the  child  of  patriotism,  and,  as  may  be  readily  con 
jectured,  it  is  peculiarly  and  entirely  an  American  order. 
Not  American  in  that  narrow  sense  which  questions  a 
man's  birthplace,  or  inquires  into  his  theological  or  anti- 
theological  opinions;  but  American  in  a  broader  and 
more  comprehensive  definition.  American  as  Niagara 
is  an  American  cataract,  and  the  Columbia  an  Ameri 
can  river.  There  are  tribes  of  our  order  whose  coun 
cil  fires  are  kindled  near  the  icy  glint  of  lakes  which 
lie  far  beyond  the  northern  confines  of  the  Republic. 
There  may  be  wigwams  shadowed  by  the  forests  which 
circle'  the  base  of  Orizaba.  The  order  invites  to  its 


290  CALIFORNIA   ANTHOLOGY. 

membership  all  worthy  pale  faces,  whether  aliens  or 
citizens,  wherever  born  or  of  whatever  faith.  It  is 
American  only  in  the  sense  that  its  spirit  is  the  spirit 
of  the  mountains,  the  forests,  the  prairies,  the  cataracts, 
the  white-lipped  lightning,  and  the  thunder's  voice.  It 
gathers  its  traditions  from  the  lost  races  who  have 
passed  away  and  who  left  in  some  places  the  imprints 
of  a  strange  civilization,  and  in  others  the  mementos 
of  a  cruel  barbarism — races  which  like  those  of  En 
gland,  seem  to  have  had  an  age  of  stone  and  an  age  of 
bronze,  but,  unlike  those  of  Europe,  never  an  age  of 
iron;  races  which  have  left  behind  them  the  casas 
grandes  of  New  Mexico,  the  ancient  fortifications  of 
the  Mississippi  Valley,  the  sculptured  monoliths  of 
Copan,  the  aqueducts  and  cities  of  Arizona,  and  the 
pyramids  of  Northern  Mexico;  races  whose  carvings 
in  stone,  and  whose  ornaments  in  pottery  and  metal, 
and  shells,  and  obsidian,  and  porphyry,  are  often  un 
earthed  all  the  way  from  Lake  Superior  to  the  Belize; 
races  whose  temples  are  crumbled,  whose  gods  are 
vanished,  and  whose  records  exist  only  in  the  undeci 
pherable  hieroglyphics  of  a  language  lost  and  gone. 

Our  wigwams  we  dedicate  to  the  use  of  an  order 
whose  chief  object  is  brotherhood  and  charity ;  an  order 
which  hopes  to  accomplish  its  benign  purposes  through 
the  love  that  comes  from  knowledge  of  each  other,  and 
the  strength  that  is  born  of  association  and  cohesion. 

Perhaps  there  is  not,  in  the  whole  vast  vocabulary  of 
human  speech,  syllables  more  articulate  with  honorable 
emotion  than  that  one  word — "  dedicate."  In  the 


FRATERNAL    SOCIETIES.  291 

beginning,  when  the  morning  stars  sang  together,  the 
first  grand  dedication  was  made,  and  I  wonder  that 
painters  of  the  preTRaphaelite  school  did  not  choose 
this  subject  of  all  others  for  their  master  efforts.  A 
new  and  swinging  world,  plucked  out  of  the  stilly  and 
starless  unknown,  her  brooks  filtrated  from  the  mists 
of  chaotic  wastes,  her  fields  unblown,  her  first  born 
forests  yet  succulent  with  nature's  milk,  her  airs  warm 
with  wooing  motion,  and  her  freshly-tinted  skies  paint 
ing  the  crest  of  creation  upon  new-made  lake  and  river. 
Suns  unshorn  of  a  virgin  beam,  and  moons  propelled 
along  unplowed  paths,  and  stars  yet  untaught  in  sentinel 
duty,  over  all  this  songless  world  shone  ever.  What 
though  but  a  dew-drop  hanging  from  the  finger  of  the 
Great  Author!  It  was  a  world  set  apart  for  the  uses 
of  mortal  man,  and  dedicated  in  the  presence  of  angels 
to  the  universal  brotherhood. 

No  dedication  ever  brought  evil  to  mankind.  It  is 
an  observation  of  history,  that  the  temple  and  the 
tabernacle,  whether  dedicated  to  the  Oracle,  to  the 
Unknown  God,  or  the  One  Supreme,  or  to  Love  and 
Charity,  still  retain  the  master  idea  of  ages  old,  still 
rear  their  proportions,  a  perpetual  rebuke  to  tyranny, 
and  always  a  stronghold  of  rectitude  and  justice,  catching 
glints  (even  through  the  quagmires  of  the  superstitions 
of  heathen  nations,  or  the  jungles  of  obscure  faiths)  of 
that  celestial  light  which  must  endure  forever. 

The  walls  of  our  wigwams  shall  never  echo  a  senti 
ment  that  is  not  kindly,  and  their  doors  shall  never 
open  for  a  deed  of  injury  to  any  human  being.  When 


292  CALIFORNIA    ANTHOLOGY. 

we  have  been  gathered  to  the  hunting  grounds  of  the 
summer  land  our  wigwams  will  look  upon  a  field  of 
labor  and  supply  larger  than  we  know.  A  million  souls 
shall  dwell  on  the  peninsula  of  San  Francisco;  temples 
of  art  and  industry,  and  science  and  religion,  and 
benevolence,  shall  send  a  thousand  spires  to  the  skies. 
The  out-reaching  arms  of  an  iron-Briareus  will  bring  to 
our  doors  the  trophies  of  a  conquest  which  commerce 
shall  achieve  over  forty  degrees  of  latitude.  And  still, 
even  as  Yosemite,  in  the  presence  of  awe-struck  tour 
ists,  tosses  her  soft  white  lace  of  falling  waters  to  the 
air,  as  simply  and  as  purely  as  in  the  days  when  she 
was  alone  with  the  forests  and  the  meadows,  so  will 
the  maxims  and  the  deeds  and  the  life  of  this  Order 
bear  themselves  serene  amid  the  din  of  human  indus 
try  and  the  selfishness  of  human  struggle. —  l^homas 
Fitch. 


ANCIENT  ORDER  OF  UNITED  WORKMEN. 

244.  It  builds  no  palatial  offices  for  its  managers, 
it  accumulates  no  hoard  to  tempt  its  treasurer.  It 
has  ten  thousand  trustees  in  California  alone.  Every 
man  holds  a  dollar  of  the  funds,  which  he  lays  at  the 
desolated  fireside  of  the  stricken.  When  the  humblest 
member  of  the  Order  of  this  State  dies,  its  Governor 
contributes  to  the  fund  for  his  widow.  It  brings  a  man 
into  good  company,  and  makes  the  most  out  of  him.  It 
teaches  the  hand  of  velvet  to  rest  with  confidence 
within  the  hand  of  iron.  The  banker  and  the  baker 


FRATERNAL    SOCIETIES.  293 

are  one  for  an  hour  of  need.  The  weary  farmer  rests 
his  head  upon  his  pillow  with  the  assurance  that,  if  he 
fails  to  greet  the  morning  light,  the  faith  of  ten  thous 
and  men  is  pledged  to  lift  that  nightmare  of  a  mortgage. 
It  commends  sobriety,  exalts  labor,  and  enjoins  virtue. 
It  shadows  the  land  like  a  fleecy  cloud,  ready,  when  the 
thunder  rolls,  to  drop  showers  of  blessings  in  barren 
places. 

It  gathers  money  quietly,  with  little  effort  here  and 
there,  as  the  sun  drinks  dew  from  the  open  hearts  of 
a  thousand  flowers,  and  returns  it  when  and  where  most 
needed.  It  is  instinct  with  the  truest,  broadest  hu 
manity;  it  teaches  men  to  help  themselves,  and  "do  as 
they  would  be  done  by."  It  has  not  aroused  jealousy 
in  other  benevolent  and  fraternal  organizations.  They 
recognize  that  it  supplies  a  want,  and  extend  it  their 
support.  It  is  a  grand  experiment.  Other  Orders  are 
true  through  life;  some  do  relieve  to  a  certain  extent 
the  widows  and  children;  this  assures  them  of  a  right, 
almost  a  competence.  It  is  the  severest  test  yet  made 
of  the  fraternal  spirit.  It  is  the  flower  of  the  ages,  a 
culminating  blossom  on  the  aloe  that  requires  thousands 
of  years  to  develop  a  bloom. — Philip  M.  Fisher. 


FRATERNAL  INSURANCE  SOCIETIES. 

245.  The  establishment  of  fraternal  insurance 
associations  upon  a  practical  and  permanent  basis  is 
among  the  chief  triumphs  of  the  human  mind — in  the 
line  of  moral  invention.  That  this  grand  consumma- 


294  CALIFORNIA   ANTHOLOGY. 

tion,  or  it  may  be  called  discovery,  should  be  reserved 
for  our  day,  must  excite  at  once  our  pride  and  our 
wonder.  At  once  simple  in  its  operation  and  grand  in 
its  results,  we  are  amazed  that  its  blessings  were  not 
enjoyed  by  our  remote  ancestry  as  they  will  be  by  our 
remote  prosterity.  If,  as  the  great  poet  of  humanity 
tells  us,  "  all  the  world's  a  stage,  and  all  the  men  and 
women  merely  players,"  proud,  indeed,  may  we  be,  and 
proud,  indeed,  we  are,  that  we  are  actors  in  this  new 
drama  of  brotherly  love ;  surprised,  indeed,  may  we  be, 
and  surprised  indeed  we  are,  that  this  drama  was  not 
put  on  the  stage  of  human  action  until  the  Star  of 
Empire  had  gilded  the  remotest  West,  and  more  than 
eighteen  centuries  after  the  Star  of  Bethlehem  first 
illumined  the  Eastern  world.  It  is  given  us  now,  in 
the  fullness  of  time — a  living  fact,  a  beautiful  reality. 

This  great  work  of  fraternal  insurance  is  now  being 
prosecuted  on  a  broad  basis,  and  is  the  mission  of 
several  powerful  organizations,  chief  among  which  are 
The  Ancient  Order  of  United  Workmen,  The  Knights 
of  Honor,  The  American  Legion  of  Honor,  The 
Knights  of  Pythias,  and  The  Order  of  Chosen  Friends. 

The  great  truth  that  one  can  rarely  help  many,  but 
many  can  often  help  one,  has  never  been  so  generally 
exemplified  as  now,  in  the  lives  and  conduct  of  men. 
Closely  allied  to  it,  and  entitled  to  a  like  recognition,  is 
that  other  great  truth,  which  Odd  Fellowship  has  done 
so  much  to  impress  upon  the  minds  and  hearts  of  men» 
that  all  men  are  brothers,  having  a  common  origin  and 
a  common  father.  As  upon  two  certain  command- 


FRATERNAL    SOCIETIES.  295 

ments  in  Holy  Writ  "hang  all  the  law  and  the 
prophets,"  so  upon  these  two  golden  truths  rest  the 
stately  edifices  of  these  Orders  whose  names  I  cluster 
here.  The  work  and  mission  of  these  fraternities  are 
worthy  to  engage  the  noblest  mind,  the  most  eloquent 
tongue,  the  amplest,  study,  the  closest  scrutiny,  the 
broadest  criticism.  They  present  no  abstraction,  no 
abstruse  proposition,  no  occult  science,  no  perplexing 
theory,  no  knotty  problem.  They  unfold  a  new  system 
of  organized  benevolence,  a  new  plan  of  co-operative 
effort  for  mutual  security  against  want  and  distress. 

No  zealous  member  of  either  of  these  societies  can 
fail  to  cherish  an  abiding  love  for  the  Ancient  Order  of 
United  Workmen.  That  fraternity  first  opened  up 
the  broad  highway  that  leads  to  perfect  security  in  life 
insurance.  To  the  beauties  and  charms  of  Freemasonry 
and  Odd  Fellowship  it  adds  a  more  substantial  feature. 
It  has  found  a  way  whereby  men  may  help  their  fel 
lows  without  making  the  recipients  of  their  bounty 
objects  of  charity.  Throwing  its  fraternal  arms  around 
each  brother  in  life,  it  watches  over  him  in  sickness  and 
death,  gives  him  to  the  grave  with  tenderness  and  tears, 
then  goes  to  his  widow  and  orphan  and  empties  into 
their  laps  its  purse  of  gold. 

And  this  it  does,  not  as  charity  but  as  a  right.  It 
simply  executes  a  sacred  trust.  It  merely  turns  over 
to  loved  ones  left  behind,  that  which  has  been  honorably 
won  for  them,  and  which  is  legally  their  due.  All  this 
it  does,  and  in  all  this  it  finds  a  noble  rival  in  each  of 
the  other  orders  whose  names  I  have  lovingly  entwined 
with  its  own. 


296  CALIFORNIA   ANTHOLOGY. 

We  who  belong  to  these  fraternal  bands,  are  mindful 
of  the  compensations  of  Nature  which  make  life  such 
a  thrilling  drama.  We  need  no  skeleton  transfixed 
upon  our  walls  to  remind  us  of  our  end.  It  was  the 
mighty  fact  of  Death  that  called  us  into  being.  A 
serene  consciousness  of  our  mortality  binds  us  to 
gether,  and  will  abide  with  us  on  the  mountain's  top 
and  in  the  meadow's  lap — when  the  frost  is  biting  and 
when  the  flowers  are  blooming — not  pursuing  us  like 
an  avenging  fury — not  lowering  over  us  like  a  black 
shadow  to  blight  the  landscape  of  our  life;  but  as  the 
fiat  of  a  just  God,  to  purge  us  of  our  dross,  to  stimu 
late  our  noblest  faculties,  to  strengthen  our  manhood, 
and  to  enable  us  to  confront  with  serenity  and  hope, 
"  the  great  mystery  of  the  grave." 

Verily,  beloved  Orders!  As  ye  multiply  in  numbers, 
ye  shall  remain  but  one  in  essence.  Ye  differ  from 
each  other  only  as  one  star  differs  from  another  star  in 
glory.  Rooted  in  the  hearts,  and  devoted  to  the  wants 
of  men,  ye  will  never  pause  or  tire  until  some  more 
powerful  organization,  with  a  greater  capacity  for  good, 
and  more  adapted  to  the  spirit  of  the  remote  age  that 
gives  it  birth,  shall  take  the  sceptre  from  your  hands. 
Engaged  in  a  common  cause,  pursue  your  beneficent 
mission  with  unfaltering  step.  While  cherishing  a  spirit 
of  generous  rivalry,  may  ye  ever  feel  the  impulse  of 
a  common  purpose,  and  move  onward,  hand  in  hand,  to 
the  fulfillment  of  your  destiny. 

But  yesterday  ye  were  an  enigma  to  the  multitude. 
Now  ye  are  known  and  read  of  all  men.  The  world 


FRATERNAL  SOCIETIES.  297 

sees  your  work.  Humanity  applauds  it.  And  the 
marvelous  story  of  your  birth  will  be  written  by  more 
than  mortal  fingers,  to  be  preserved  in  the  Archives  of 
Eternity. 

And  when  the  bound  volumes  of  centuries  shall  have 
been  laid  away  on  the  broad  shelf  of  time,  and  coming 
generations  shall  look  back  to  this  era  as  to  the  infancy 
of  the  earth,  these  Orders  will  continue  to  be  recog 
nized  as  the  strongest  ties  among  men,  and  the  widow 
and  the  orphan  will  point  to  them  with  gratitude  and 
exultation. 

To  Thee,  great  Author  of  the  Book  of  Life,  who 
teacheth  to  men  the  lessons  of  humility  and  interdepend 
ence — who  knoweth  wherefore  death  came  into  the 
world,  and  all  our  woe — who  hath  endowed  with  more 
than  mortal  powers  that  offshoot  of  Thy  mind,  the  mind 
of  man — whose  comprehensive  love  doth  wrap  all  souls, 
all  worlds,  all  things  that  space  can  hold  or  thought  can 
reach — in  whose  grand  plan  the  tiniest  atoms  find  rec 
ognition — God  of  the  Storm,  at  whose  command  the 
warring  elements  lay  down  their  arms  and  fold  their 
hands  in  peace!  God  of  the  storm-rocked  soul!  whose 
power  is  revealed  not  more  terribly  in  the  external 
world  than  in  that  fiercer  realm,  the  human  breast — to 
Thee,  unfailing  source  of  life  and  hope,  we  address  our 
perpetual  appeal! 

O,  Spirit  of  Brotherly  Love!  Ever  poised  on  healing 
wings  above  the  smitten  heart,  sending  thy  unfaltering 
ministers  into  every  home  of  desolation:  we  offer  thee 
the  incense  of  our  grateful  salutation !  Thou  art  a 


298  CALIFORNIA   ANTHOLOGY. 

spirit  of  love  indeed!  Thou  art  a  harbinger  of  mercy! 
Thou  art  clothed  with  light  as  with  a  garment!  Thy 
voice  is  like  the  melody  of  the  brook,  thy  smile  like  the 
golden  dawn  of  day!  Thou  art  brightest  in  the  pres 
ence  of  gloom,  thou  art  bravest  in  crises  of  want  and 
misery!  No  human  anguish  can  turn  thee  aside,  no 
conflict  of  arms  can  put  thee  to  flight,  no  plague  or 
pestilence  can  beat  thee  back!  Thy  destiny  is  inter 
woven  with  that  of  the  race  whose  wayward  steps  thou 
watchest,  and  whose  woes  thou  dost  assuage!  There 
have  been  Dark  Ages,  because  thou  hast  hid  thy  face; 
but  through  the  eons  of  coming  time,  thou  wilt  ever 
live  among  men  and  go  with  them  from  the  cradle  to 
the  grave. — Oscar  T.  Shuck. 


DISTINGUISHED    MEN 


PART  VIII. 


DISTINGUISHED  MEN. 


246.  To  the  Infinite  Eye,  the  qualities  that  are 
housed  in  character  only,  have  weight.  Indeed,  even 
with  us,  they  are  not  reckoned  out,  when  we  weigh  men. 
We  say  an  eloquent  man  has  weight  on  the  platform,  as 
naturally  as  that  the  fat  man  has  weight  on  Fairbanks' 
scales.  I  greatly  admire  the  philosophy  wrapped  up  in 
the  Hoosier's  answer  to  the  Yankee,  when  asked  how 
much  he  weighed:  "I  weigh  180  pounds  as  you  see 
me,  but  when  I'm  mad  I  weigh  a  ton."  Almost  the  first 
question  we  ask  concerning  the  newly-arrived  man  on 
our  planet,  is  "  How  much  does  he  weigh  ?"  And  it  is 
wonderful  how  much  weight  is  increased  by  the  proper 
gymnastic  training  of  our  spirits.  Wellington,  at  the 
start,  weighed  ten  pounds;  before  he  died  he  weighed 
Great  Britain  and  the  balance  of  Europe.  Jefferson 
was  tossed  easily  in  his  nurse's  arms  at  first;  but  later 
he  lifted  America.  Newton  hung  very  lightly  on  the 
steel-yards,  when  first  known;  but  afterwards  he  hung 
all  the  planets  on  the  steel-yards  that  he  suspended. 

—  Thomas  Starr  King. 
20 


300  CALIFORNIA    ANTHOLOGY. 

LOUIS  AGASSIZ. 

(DIED  DECEMBER  I4TH,  1873.) 

247.- 

Open  your  gates,  O  grave! 

Make  broad  your  passage  way! 

The  form,  for  which  we  ask  a  place, 

Is  not  of  common  clay. 

The  fertile  brain,  the  silver  tongue, 

The  genial  voice  which  we 

Rejoiced  to  hear,  are  still.     We  bring 

The  dust  of  Agassiz. 

Chant  in  the  pines,  ye  winds, 

Murmur,  ye  waters  deep; 

The  searcher  of  your  heights  and  depths 

Lies  in  his  last  calm  sleep. 

The  seeker  after  truth  and  light, 

The  reader  of  the  past, 

The  leader  in  incessant  work, 

Has  found  his  rest  at  last. 

Ye  rustling  autumn  leaves, 

Drop  gently  o'er  his  tomb! 

Ye  creatures  whom,  in  life,  he  loved, 

In  reverent  silence  come! 

Pupils  that  by  his  earnest  life 

And  burning  words  were  led, 

Gather  around  his  quiet  grave 

In  tribute  to  the  dead! 

Earth,  in  thy  bosom  sweet, 
And  soft  brown  mantle,  fold 


DISTINGUISHED    MEN.  301 


The  ashes  of  the  sage,  who  taught 
That  truth  is  more  than  gold. 
Leave  to  the  warlike  chieftains 
The  vaunted  laurel  crown ! 
Be  lilies,  white,  and  violets, 
Upon  this  grave,  laid  down. 

—  W.  H.  Dall. 


GEN.  E.  D.  BAKER. 

248.  One  there  was  whose  noble  form  was  in  our 
midst,  it  seems,  but  yesterday — gifted  with  power  to 
touch  the  chords  of  every  heart,  endowed  with  magic 
to  open  the  fountains  of  laughter  or  of  tears — whose 
words  could  soothe  the  malignity  of  foes,  and  lift  the 
mind  to  regions  of  serenest  thought;  to  whom  eloquence 
was  but  the  out-breathing  of  his  soul — gone  now,  swept 
down  in  the  fierce  tide  of  battle!  That  wondrous  brain, 
at  one  momenr  the  home  of  strange  fancies,  the  next, 
insensate  clay!  No  more  shall  his  glorious  words 
kindle  the  enthusiasm  of  our  hearts,  no  more  his  eagle 
eye  flash  with  the  hidden  fires  of  the  soul. — Newton 
Booth. 

249.- 

Leap  up,  My  country!  not  alone  the  sword 
Is  swift  and  strong; 
The  eloquent  and  soul-inspiring  word, 
The  earnest  flow  of  song — 


302  CALIFORNIA   ANTHOLOGY. 

All  these  may  in  a  whelming  force  be  poured 
'Gainst  citadels  of  wrong. 

No  one  unto  himself  is  solely  lent; 

Each  human  soul 

Must  with  the  surging  tides  of  life  be  blent. 

The  stars  that  roll 

In  shining  orbits  through  the  firmament 

Are  parts  of  one  great  whole. 

A  star!     He  was  a  star!  whose  radiance  here 

Thro'  the  dark  night  of  war, 

Lit  up  our  hearts  with  tenderest  beams  of  cheer 

None  may  restore; 

And  thus  we  mourn  him  stricken  from  our  sphere 

To  shine  on  us  no  more. 

Lay  him  all  gently  on  his  mother  Earth! 
While  tears,  like  rain, 

Bedew  his  grave  from  nation  and  from  hearth 
There  rests  no  stain 

Upon  his  sword,  no  tarnish  on  his  worth- 
So  dust  to  dust,  again. 

— Mrs.  James  Neale. 

2BO.  IT  WAS  something  more  than  the  fierce  thirst 
for  glory  that  carried  the  Senator  to  the  field  of  sacri 
fice.  Hero  blood  is  patriot  blood.  It  was  in  the  spirit 
of  the  patriot  hero  that  the  gallant  soldier,  the  grave 
Senator,  the  white-haired  man  of  counsel,  yet  full  of 
youth  as  full  of  years,  gave  answer  as  does  the  war-horse 
to  the  trumpet's  sound.  The  wisdom  of  his  conduct 
was  questioned.  Many  thought  that  he  should  remain 


DISTINGUISHED    MEN.  303 

for  counsel  in  the  Senate-hall.  The  propriety  of  a 
Senator  taking  upon  himself  the  duties  of  a  soldier,  de 
pends,  like  many  other  things,  on  circumstances;  cer 
tainly  such  conduct  has  the  sanction  of  the  example  of 
great  names.  Socrates,  who  was  not  of  the  councils  of 
Athens  simply  because  he  deemed  his  office  of  a  teacher 
of  wisdom  a  higher  and  nobler  one,  did  not  think  it 
unworthy  of  himself  to  serve  as  a  common  soldier  in 
battle.  In  the  days  when  Greece  was  free,  when  Rome 
was  free,  when  Venice  was  free,  who  but  their  great 
statesmen,  counsellors  and  senators,  led  their  armies  to 
victorious  battle?  In  the  best  days  of  all  the  great  and 
free  States,  civil  place  and  distinction  were  never  held 
inconsistent  with  military  authority  and  conduct.  So 
far  from  it,  all  history  teaches  the  fact  that  those  who 
have  proved  themselves  most  competent  to  direct  and 
administer  the  affairs  of  government  in  times  of  peace, 
were  not  only  trusted,  but  were  best  trusted  with  the 
conduct  of  armies  in  times  of  war. — Gen.  Jas.  A. 
McDougall. 

251.  His  CAREER  from  the  time  he  came  to  Cali 
fornia,  is  depicted  in  characters  such  as  checker  the 
earth  when  the  morning  sun,  coming  from  the  chambers 
of  the  east,  illumines  with  a  glory  only  its  own,  every 
mountain  top,  and  every  city,  and  every  hamlet  spire, 
and  every  ascending  slope,  and  every  aspiring  ridge  on 
which  he  turns,  leaving  behind  them  the  long  dark 
shadows  of  the  still  lingering  night.  Gradually,  as  he 
rose  to  the  zenith,  those  shadows,  one  by  one,  in 
couples,  in  multitudes,  fled  away,  until  there  lay  none 


304  CALIFORNIA   ANTHOLOGY. 

upon  the  scene  save  the  few  dark  lines  that  fell  on  the 
frozen  North.  These  were  the  icy  souls  that  no  heat 
of  genius,  no  light  of  intellect,  no  fire  of  patriotism, 
could  dispel. 

To  the  untutored  eye  he  presented  nothing  remarka 
ble;  but  to  the  educated  vision  he  presented  a  rare 
spectacle  of  beauty.  No  frame  was  more  admirably 
developed,  no  limbs  were  more  admirably  poised  in 
their  setting.  Every  fibre  of  his  face  was  a  line  of 
intellect,  sagacity  and  nobility;  his  entire  head  was  a 
combination  of  the  type  Roman  and  the  type  Greek 
—Caesar  and  Socrates  in  one.  There  was  not  a  rigid 
place,  not  a  waste  spot,  not  a  lacking  place  about  him; 
everywhere  throughout,  in  mind  and  body,  he  was  one 
of  the  most  supple,  elastic,  well-developed  of  men. 
Whatever  untutored  eye  might  overlook  in  him  on  the 
crowded  highways  of  life,  yet  when  he  stood  upon  feet, 
delivering  his  eloquent  utterances  to  his  countrymen, 
he  was  the  most  graceful  and  polished  of  men.  Not 
Pericles,  not  Cicero,  not  Webster,  the  grandest  of  them 
all,  in  all  the  personnel  of  the  speaker,  was  a  purer, 
more  classic  person  and  orator  than  Baker.  When  it 
is  considered  that  his  oratory  grew  and  was  schooled  in 
the  wild  west,  we  know  of  no  higher  proof  of  the 
overmastering  genius  of  the  man,  who,  from  so  rough 
a  workshop,  could  produce  what  takes  rank  with  the 
master  models  of  all  time. 

In  the  Courts,  those  cases  that  most  deeply  stir  the 
passions  of  the  soul  were  his  to  press  or  to  defend,  by 
common  consent.  In  the  lyceum,  in  the  lecture  room, 
in  the  learned  assembly,  no  man  aspired  to  be  his  peer. 


DISTINGUISHED    MEN.  305 

On  the  stump,  it  seems  to  me — I  speak  it  deliberately, 
as  the  calm  conviction  of  my  judgment — he  never  had 
a  rival  here,  nor  yet  anywhere,  nor  at  any  time.  I  have 
heard  the  most  celebrated  stump  orators.  There  was 
always  an  effort,  a  reaching  forth  for  the  outre,  and  the 
fantastic  trickery  of  humor,  to  please  the  crowd — a 
general  letting  down  to  the  vulgarities  of  the  multitude. 
No  one  of  them  seemed  to  be  able  to  hold  the  mixed 
mass  without  resorts  to  the  craft  that  wheedles  or  that 
makes  them  stand  agape  with  laughter  or  with  wonder. 
In  one  word,  the  orator  had  to  descend  to  the  level  of 
the  lowest  of  his  hearers.  Not  so  with  Baker.  He 
lifted  the  multitude — the  red-shirted  and  the  gray ;  the 
blue-minded,  the  sour-minded,  the  envious,  the  jealous, 
the  ignorant,  and  the  wise;  the  ruffian  and  the  gentle 
man,  the  low  and  high,  all — the  great  multitude — he 
lifted  them  up  to  himslf,  face  to  face,  and  there,  like  a 
sage,  with  an  eloquence  classic  as  unapproachable,  he 
inspired  them,  the  meanest  of  them,  until  they  thought 
that  in  them  lay  sublime  power. 

We  have  been  in  the  habit  of  looking  upon  Baker 
more  in  the  light  of  an  eloquent  orator  than  in  any 
other  aspect  of  his  character.  All  will  be  surprised 
when  I  state  that  this  was  not  his  forte.  I  have  his 
own  word  for  it. 

During  an  exciting  political  campaign,  I  had  the  rare 
privilege  of  accompanying  him,  and  being  in  close  inti 
macy  with  him  day  and  night.  He  said  to  me  once, 
alone  in  our  room,  after  the  fatigues  of  the  day,  "You 
admire  my  eloquence,  for  which  I  am  really  grateful, 
but  you  do  not  know  me;  this  is  not  my  forte."  "What 


306  CALIFORNIA    ANTHOLOGY. 

can  it  be,  then?"  I  exclaimed  in  astonishment.  "If  you 
can  beat  yourself  as  an  orator,  in  another  direction,  you 
are  certainly  an  extraordinary  man."  "Well,  think 
what  you  may,"  he  replied,  "my  real  forte  is  my  power 
to  command,  rule  and  lead  men.  I  feel  that  I  can  lead 
men  anywhere." 

How  well  he  proved  his  claim  to  this  great  power — 
a  quality  that  has  no  superior  among  human  endow 
ments. 

The  axiom  of  the  ancients  that  the  orator  should  be 
a  man  of  universal  learning,  was  fulfilled  in  Baker. 
Upon  all  the  leading  sciences  and  arts,  he  had  mastered 
exhaustless  stores  of  information.  With  what  beauty 
could  he  group  his  learned  possessions!  Who  but 
Baker  could  satisfy  the  excited  heart  of  a  great  people 
on  the  laying  of  the  Atlantic  Cable,  with  a  speech  in 
which  every  line  was  equal  to  the  promise  of  that  sensi 
tive  chord  itself,  as  it  lay  under  the  ceaseless  throb  of 
the  mighty  deep?  (See  Part  X — EDITOR.) 

Not  seldom  have  I  stood  with  him  before  works  of 
art — of  the  artist  and  the  artisan — when  his  rare  ability 
of  appreciative  criticism  would  have  instructed  the 
masters  of  the  works  themselves.  His  acquaintance 
with  all  the  range  of  literature  was  as  nearly  complete 
as  falls  to  the  lot  of  any  man,  and  no  human  being  ever 
knew  the  use  of  books  more  excellently  well  than  he. 
In  public  speaking,  no  man  ever  reached  higher,  and 
trod  those  altitudes  with  a  statelier  step,  or  poised  him 
self  above  them  with  a  steadier  wing,  and  all  the  way 
down  to  the  valley  of  every  day  life,  a  strange  charm 
hung  about  him. — Samuel  B.  Bell. 


DISTISGUISHED    MEN.  307 

JOSEPH  G.  BALDWIN. 

252.      My  friendship  for  Mr.  Baldwin  commenced 
lono-  before    he  came    to  the   bench,  and  it  afterward 

o 

warmed  into  the  attachment  of  a  brother.  He  had  a 
great  and  generous  heart;  there  was  no  virtue  of  which 
he  did  not  possess  a  goodly  portion.  He  was  always 
brim  full  of  humor,  throwing  off  his  jokes,  which 
sparkled  without  burning,  like  the  flashes  of  a  rocket. 
There  was  no  sting  in  his  wit.  You  felt  as  full  of  merri 
ment  at  one  of  his  witticisms,  made  at  your  expense, 
as  when  it  was  played  upon  another.  Yet  he  was  a 
profound  lawyer,  and  some  of  his  opinions  are  models 
of  style  and  reasoning.  The  opinion  of  the  Supreme 
Court  of  California  in  Hart  vs.  Burnett,  prepared  by 
Mr.  Justice  Baldwin,  is  without  precedent  for  the  ex 
haustive  learning  and  research  it  exhibits  upon  the 
points  discussed.  (The  report  of  this  case — Hart  vs. 
Burnett — covers  100  pages  of  the  i5th  volume  of  Cali 
fornia  Reports,  of  which  79  pages,  octavo,  are  devoted 
to  Justice  Baldwin's  decision — THE  EDITOR.) 

— Judge  Stephen  J.  Field. 


DAVID  C.  BRODERICK. 

253.  He  had  a  scorn  of  falsehood  and  prevarica 
tion  which  it  exceeds  the  power  of  language  to  express. 
He  had  a  love  of  truth,  a  directness  of  purpose,  a  sim 
plicity  of  manner,  impressing  conviction  on  all  ingenu- 


308  CALIFORNIA    ANTHOLOGY. 

ous  minds,  and  confounding  the  craft  of  his  opponents. 
He  had  a  bold,  outspoken  frankness,  a  tenacity  of  pur 
pose,  an  indomitable  will,  and  an  unflinching  bravery, 
which  commanded  admiration  and  often  conquered  suc 
cess,  even  when  they  did  not  win  conviction.     He  was 
quick  of  perception,  ready  in  resource,  faithful  in  friend 
ship,  true  to  his  pledges,  consistent  in  principle.  Withal, 
he  was  placid  in  demeanor;  his  smile  was  winning,  and 
the  natural  tones  of  his  voice  in  conversation  often  as 
gentle  as  those  of  a  woman.     In  morals  he  was  pure, 
far  beyond  the  common  standard  of  public  men.      But 
if  he  had  great  merits  he  had  great  defects  also.     He 
was  often  too  open  and  free  of  expression,   sometimes 
employing  unmeasured  denunciation,  when  silent  con 
tempt  would  have  been  equally  or  even  more  effective. 
He  was  often   too  bold,  too  fond  of#  effecting  by  sheer 
force  of  will  what  might  have  been  as  well  accomplished 
with  more  moderation.     His  openness  prevented  him 
at  times  from  a  cautious  withholding  of  his  plans  until 
they  were  sufficiently  ripe,  and  made  them  liable  to  sur 
prise  and  counter-plot.     He  was  too  magnanimous;   he 
could  not  believe  that  the  same  generosity  which  would 
conquer  himself  would  not  subdue  others.     He  was  too 
often  deceived  by  those  who  came    to   him  with  pro 
fessions  of  friendship  or  repentance;  when  he  forgave 
an  offense,  he  seemed  to  forget  that  it  had  ever  been 
committed,  although  the  injury  might  have  involved 
treachery  to  himself  or  a  betrayal  of  his  confidence. 
He  was  sometimes  imperious,  even  beyond  the  privi 
lege  of  a  party  leader ;   he  often   offended,   and  some 
times  estranged,  those  who  thought  that  even  in  the 


DISTINGUISHED    MEN.  309 

emergency  of  an  unexpected  crisis,  they  ought  to  be 
consulted.  This  last,  however,  was  not  owing  to  a 
defect  of  temper,  but  to  a  principle  which  Broderick 
assumed,  that  to  be  a  party  leader,  one  must  be  ac 
knowledged  as  qualified  to  lead,  and  that  in  a  sudden 
crisis,  he  becomes  a  dictator  so  far  as  regards  the  tactics 
of  his  party.  He  sometimes  made  great  mistakes,  but 
they  were  errors  of  policy  and  tactics ;  they  never 
involved  consistency  of  purpose  or  of  principle.  These 
were  his  greatest  faults,  but  even  these  were  the  faults 
of  a  great,  generous  nature.  It  was  doubtless  fortu 
nate  for  his  country,  although  a  source  of  melancholy 
to  him,  that  Broderick  became  isolated,  with  no  kin 
dred  to  participate  in  his  fortune  and  his  success — that 
he  had  no  wife  or  children  to  share  in  his  affections,  or 
to  distract  his  purposes.  The  man  lost  in  domestic 
enjoyment,  but  the  public  gained  in  the  efforts  of  his 
undivided  patriotism  and  singleness  of  purpose.  Sim 
ple  of  tastes,  with  no  expensive  habits,  and  disbursing 
more  for  purposes  of  religion  and  charity  than  was  de 
manded  for  all  the  other  outlays  of  his  life,  whether 
personal,  political,  literary  or  aesthetic,  he  was  above 
corruption,  because  he  was  superior  to  avarice,  and  to 
the  lust  or  necessity  of  gain;  and  the  only  temptations 
to  which  he  was  subject  as  a  public  man  were  the  stim 
ulus  of  a  patriotic  ambition  and  the  cravings  for  an 
honest  fame. 

I  do  not  wonder  that  the  people  of  the  prehistoric 
ages  deified  many  of  their  great  men  who  were  cut  off 
in  the  prime  of  their  powers.  If  we  read  the  obscure 
lessons  of  history  aright,  I  do  not  doubt  that  the  demi- 


310  CALIFORNIA   ANTHOLOGY. 

gods  of  antiquity  were  but  the  historic  memories  of 
great  men  whose  mission  had  been  interrupted  by 
death — a  catastrophe  to  which  the  wants  and  hopes  of 
their  contemporaries  could  not  be  reconciled.  Could  so 
much  power,  so  much  potential  goodness  die?  Would 
they  not  return  again  to  earth,  where  so  much  remained 
for  their  accomplishment,  so  much  for  them  to  do? 

Hope  awaited  their  new  advent  until  "hope  waited 
against  hope,"  and  finally  deified  the  attribute  whose 
return  to  earth  had  ceased  to  be  expected.  "They 
will  no  more  contend  beside  us  in  our  earthly  conflicts, 
but  for  us  with  the  fates  above." 

When  we  see  the  aged  Adams  expiring  in  the  Capi 
tol,  we  are  ready  to  exclaim  with  him,  "  This  is  the  last 
of  life."  When  the  great  soul  of  Clay  sends  up  its 
last  aspiration  in  the  legislative  city  where  his  life  had 
been  spent,  we  ejaculate  a  reverential  "Amen!"  WThen 
the  wearied  spirit  of  Calhoun,  in  its  intense  intellectual 
activity,  wears  away  the  last  thin  film  which  binds  it  to 
corporeal  life,  we  joyfully  chant  at  once  the  "  Requi- 
escat "  and  the  "  Resurgam."  When  the  great  intellect 
of  Webster  seeks  a  death-bed  in  the  retreats  of  his 
"  Sabine  farm,"  we  tune  our  throats  to  the  Non  omnis 
moriar  of  Horace,  and  the  more  sublime,  "I  still  live!" 
of  the  Puritan  patriot.  But  when  one  goes  forth  like 
Broderick,  in  the  maturity  of  his  manhood,  in  the  full 
ness  of  his  powers,  in  the  ripeness  of  his  intellect,  in 
the  perfection  of  his  moral  discipline,  hoping  so  much 
himself,  and  of  whom  so  much  was  hoped — when  such 
a  one  lies  down  forever  upon  his  bloody  couch  we  are 
as  unreconciled  as  the  husband  over  the  grave  of  his 


DISTINGUISHED    MEN.  311 

first  love ;  as  inconsolable  as  the  mother  over  the  corpse 
of  her  first  born.  With  swelling  hearts  and  tearful 
eyes,  we  vainly  protest  against  the  irreversible  decree, 
and  are  almost  tempted  to  exclaim:  "  It  cannot,  must 
not,  shall  not  be!"  But  alas,  while  we  struggle  in  the 
closing  coils  of  a  great  grief,  the  departing  spirit  passes 
onward,  solemn,  silent,  and  majestic,  towards  the  spirit 
land,  ever  expanding  its  colossal  proportions  as  it 
recedes,  until  it  is  swallowed  up  by  the  still  more 
gigantic  darkness.  And  while  we  still  gaze,  with  long 
ing,  eager,  straining  eyes,  as  if  the  rending  veil  of  night 
would  again  reveal  his  returning  form,  comes  to  us 
upon  the  moaning  wind  from  the  great  Walhalla  of  the 
dead:  "  He  will  not  turn  back  again,  he  will  return  to 
earth  no  more." 

God  speed  thee,  then,  true  son  of  the  masses,  most 
appreciated  when  forever  lost!  Brave  type  of  man 
hood!  Bright  example  of  self-reliance  and  self-culture! 
Noble  illustration  of  free  institutions!  Firm  patriot 
and  true  man,  friend  dearly  loved  and  truly  mourned, 
farewell,  farewell! — John  W.  Dwinelle. 

264.  The  politician  and  the  ambitious  man  of  the 
world,  as  he  appeared  to  most  people,  was  the  worst 
side  of  his  character.  His  intellect  was  of  the  quickest 
and  most  comprehensive  order,  and  his  will  was  so 
powerful  as  to  enable  him  to  concentrate  his  whole 
mind  on  any  given  subject.  Hence,  in  the  midst  ot 
the  most  exciting  political  contest,  he  could  at  will 
withdraw  his  mind  from  it,  and  give  the  closest  attention 
to  whatever  he  was  reading.  His  active  intellect  com- 


312  CALIFORNIA   ANTHOLOGY. 

pelled  him  to  read,  for  he  had  little  relish  for  vulgar 
amusements,  and  his  tastes  always  inclined  him  to  be 
very  much  alone.  He  was  almost  an  ascetic  in  his 
life  and  habits.  His  passions  and  appetites  were  com 
pletely  subject  to  his  will.  Accordingly,  he  read  im 
mensely.  Of  classic  English  literature  he  had  read 
everything;  and  what  he  read,  he  analyzed,  weighed, 
and  considered.  His  nights  were  spent  over  the  works 
of  the  grand  old  masters.  No  one  who  did  not  know 
him  intimately  would  have  supposed  on  meeting  him 
in  the  street,  that  he  had  spent  half  of  the  night  previ 
ous  in  reading  the  most  abstruse  poetry.  Yet' very 
likdy  such  was  the  fact.  The  works  of  all  the  great 
poets  were  as  familiar  to  him  as  houshold  words.  His 
tastes  led  him  to  admire  the  weird-like,  subtle,  and 
mysterious.  Of  all  English  poets,  he  especially  ad 
mired  the  mystic,  spiritual  Shelley.  Tennyson,  too, 
was  a  great  favorite  of  his;  so  was  Wordsworth.  But 
how  few  of  those  who  supposed  they  knew  him  well, 
had  any  idea  of  his  rich  stores  of  classic  knowledge. 
He  had  such  an  aversion  to  anything  looking  like 
pedantry  or  affectation,  that  only  very  few,  and  those 
his  most  intimate  and  trusted  friends,  were  aware  how 
extensive  was  his  reading,  and  how  general  his  knowl 
edge  of  books  and  men.  He  also  felt  his  want  of  early 
education,  and  distrusted  himself  very  much  when  books 
and  literature  were  under  discussion.  Yet  as  he  grew 
older  and  came  more  in  contact  with  men,  he  more 
fully  appreciated  his  own  powers.  During  a  long  per 
sonal  intimacy,  I  can  recollect  no  act  of  his  unworthy 
of  a  man.  I  have  walked  the  streets  for  hours  with  him 


DISTINGUISHED    MEN.  313 

when  the  world  was  wrapped  in  slumber,  and  conversed 
on  every  conceivable  subject,  but  never  knew  him  to 
give  expression  to  a  low  or  ignoble  thought.  I  was  his 
friend,  and,  knowing  him  so  well,  shall  cherish  with 
pride  his  memory  to  the  last. — Frank  Soule. 


ROBERT   BURNS. 

265.  Burns  caught  his  inspiration  in  the  walks  of 
daily  life,  amongst  his  own  class,  and  from  the  nature 
in  which  he  lived  and  had  his  being.  The  wings  on 
which  he  soared,  were  love  and  humor.  His  flights 
were  through  the  free  air,  and  were  guided  by  a  fine 
moral  sense.  He  was.  not  sublime ;  but  beyond  any 
poet,  he  comes  home  to  the  heart,  he  leads  us  into  the 
quiet  sunlight.  The  sweet  smell  of  nature  salutes  us, 
and  the  fresh  dew  hangs  trembling  on  his  leaves  and 
flowers.  By  the  rippling  streams,  on  banks  and  braes 
and  heathery  knolls,  in  the  green  dell  and  along  the 
moorland  edge,  he  takes  us.  Sometimes  his  spirit 
apostrophises  the  storm,  as  it  sways  the  lofty  pine,  and 
sweeps  through  the  forest  with  a  mighty  sigh;  but 
generally,  it  bathes  in  its  tender  light  something  that 
we  can  love.  %  *  *  Thy  voice  is  heard  as  a  sweet 
tenor! — scarce  heard,  indeed,  when  the  swell  of 
mighty  notes  prevails,  when  Milton's  superb  bass  rolls 
out,  as  from  unseen  spheres;  when  again,  the  martial 
recitative  of  Scott,  or  Byron's  sonorous  baritone  peals 
forth ;  but  ever  and  anon  stealing  in  the  ear  with  a 
quiet  melody,  clear,  simple,  and  true,  which  searches 


314  CALIFORNIA    ANTHOLOGY. 

and  plays  amongst  the  tendrils  of  our  nature,  stirring1 
the  fountains  of  tenderness  within  us,  until  the  unbidden 
tears  come  forth,  and  our  touched  hearts  acknowledge 
a  Master's  power!  A  nation's  tongues  take  up  thy 
strains!  They  go,  wandering  in  pathos  and  power, 
through  the  valleys  and  amongst  the  hills  of  thy  native 
land,  waking  her  echoes  and  sinking  into  the  hearts  of 
her  people,  softening  them  and  making  them  brave- 
prolonged  beyond  her  narrow  bounds,  and  carried 
wherever  her  sons  wander,  till  they  encircle  the  earth, 
and  from  every  clime  ascends  a  spontaneous  thank- 
offering  to  the  Great  Source  of  all  poetry,  in  gratitude 
that  He  woke  thy  glowing  minstrelsy. — George  Gordon. 


AARON  BURR. 

286.  With  many  qualities  which  go  to  make  up 
greatness,  Burr  was  not  a  great  man  in  the  highest 
sense  of  that  exalted  character.  He  was  not  great 
because  the  moral  element  was  absent,  for  which  no 
daring  deeds  or  brilliant  faculties  can  compensate.  Not 
vulgarly  selfish  in  small  things,  he  was  selfish  as  to 
everything  which  he  proposed  to  himself  as  an  object 
worthy  of  achievement  or  acquisition.  Self  was  the 
center  to  which  and  from  which  everything  else  flowed 
and  radiated.  His  country,  his  party,  his  friends,  were 
only  prized  or  regarded  as  so  many  instruments  of 
self-aggrandizement,  to  be  cherished  or  laid  aside  as 
they  were,  or  were  not,  useful  to  his  purpose.  His 
sense  of  honor  was  little  more  than  an  intense  personal 


DISTINGUISHED    MEN.  315 

pride,  and  he  was  bound  loosely,  or  scarcely  at  all,  by 
the  ties  of  justice  or  of  social  or  moral  obligation.  He 
had  no  enlarged  love  of  country  or  of  race.  He  was  not 
so  much  an  unprincipled  man  as  a  bad-principled  man. 
He  acted  from  system,  but  it  was  a  false  system.  His 
character,  so  robust  and  manly  in  some  of  its  attri 
butes,  was  deformed  by  a  love  of  intrigue,  which  de 
ceived  himself  at  the  same  time  that  it  betrayed  an 
utter  destitution  of  sincerity  and  truth.  He  was  one 
of  the  few  brave  men  who  preferred  to  prevail  by  cun 
ning  rather  than  by  strength  or  boldness.  His  intellect 
was  more  remarkable  for  cultivation,  finish  and  perfec 
tion,  for  the  number  and  activity  of  its  alert  faculties, 
than  for  its  scope,  or  comprehension.  He  was,  indeed, 
fitted  for  the  highest  excellence  in  some  executive 
posts;  but  these  were  not  the  highest  positions,  and 
did  not  require  the  highest  genius — and  even  in  these 
offices  it  was  not  safe  to  trust  him.  In  the  depth  and 
amplitude  of  his  understanding,  and  in  profound  and 
varied  learning,  he  was  not  the  equal  of  Hamilton. 
He  never  could  have  written  the  numbers  of  the 
Federalist,  or  have  debated  with  Jefferson  on  the 
Funding  Bill  or  the  Bank  of  the  United  States.  He 
left  no  favorable  opinion  of  his  genius,  or  sense  of  his 
character,  upon  the  country.  Burr  must  be  assigned  no 
higher  position  than  that  of  a  brilliant  and  unscrupu 
lous  adventurer,  with  the  good  and  bad  qualities  which 
have  distinguished  such  characters  in  all  times — in  the 
Crusades,  as  hireling  soldiers  of  fortune,  called  Knights 
of  the  Temple,  as  the  Companions  of  the  Norman  Con 
queror,  as  among  the  DeBracys,  the  Brian  de  Bois 
21 


316  CALIFORNIA    ANTHOLOGY. 

Gilberts,  the  Dalgettys  of  fiction,  and  the  Murats,  the 
Junots,  and  the  Massenas  of  modern  history.  He  was 
not  guilty  of  treason — he  was  only  a.  filibuster — the 
pioneer  of  filibusters.  As  a  man  of  intellect,  he  was 
not  comparable  with  Hamilton,  Marshall,  Jay,  Jefferson 
or  Madison.  We  know  less  of  him  as  a  statesman  than 
of  any  man  of  his  time.  He  neither  established  any 
principles  of  government,  nor  prominently  advocated 
any;  he  proposed  no  measure  of  importance;  he  left  no 
new  views  of  civil  polity,  nor  had  he  any  distinctive 
scheme  of  administration.  He  was  a  politician  rather 
than  a  statesman;  a  lawyer  rather  than  a  jurist;  more 
anxious  for  personal  success  than  the  triumph  of  a 
party;  solicitous  of  the  elevation  of  particular  men  to 
office,  especially  of  himself,  more  than  the  ascendancy 
of  any  determinate  principles.  As  a  partisan  politician, 
and  as  a  partisan  soldier,  he  was  eminent.  All  of  his 
faculties  were  employed  to  advance  the  immediate  pur 
pose  before  him;  but  he  was  too  restless  and  too  intent 
upon  the  present,  to  be  wise  or  provident  for  the  future. 
He  was  a  hand-to-mouth  politician;  he  left  the  future 
to  take  care  of  itself;  and  his  whole  failure  in  life  is  to 
be  attributed  to  this  eagerness,  impatience  and  improvi 
dence  At  an  advanced  aged  he  was  stricken 
down  by  paralysis,  a  helpless  bed-ridden  old  man  over 
whom  the  darkest  shadows  of  penury  and  desertion 
gloomed  in  the  bleak  winter  of  an  unprosperous  life, 
another  Lear  in  his  afflictions,  but  bearing  up  against 
them  with  a  buoyancy  of  spirit  which  was  denied  to 
the  smitten  king  whose  calamitous  fortunes  he  repre 
sented.  He  was  at  the  close  of  his  career  the  same 


DISTINGUISHED    MEN.  317 

man  in  all  the  characteristics  which  distinguished  him, 
that  he  was  in  his  summer  prime.  He  turned  upon 
the  misfortunes  of  his  latter  days,  and  upon  the  death 
that  was  to  consummate  or  to  end  them,  the  same  gaze 
of  unquailing  courage  and  of  cheerful  composure,  which 
he  had  turned  in  earlier  years  upon  his  mortal  enemies. 
He  died  at  the  age  of  eighty,  in  the  full  possession  of 
his  faculties,  without  a  groan  or  a  murmur.  We  are 
reminded  of  the  memorable  picture  Scott  has  drawn  of 
the  combat  between  Both  well  and  Balfour  of  Burley; 
when  the  bold  royalist  had  fallen,  his  sword-arm  broken, 
and  his  dagger  lost;  and  the  fierce  covenanter,  having 
passed  his  blade  through  his  body,  and  putting  his  foot 
upon  his  neck,  exclaimed:  "  Die  as  thou  hast  lived — 
hoping  nothing — believing  nothing,"  "and,"  said  Both- 
well,  collecting  his  whole  strength  for  his  last  respira 
tion,  "Fearing  Nothing" --Jitdge  Joseph  G.  Baldwin. 


CLAY,  WEBSTER  AND  CALHOUN. 

257.  Clay,  as  in  death  he  went  between  his  com 
peers,  so  in  his  life  he  was  a  medium  between  their  vast 
diversity;  but  Webster  and  Calhoun  were  perfect  op- 
posites  in  mind  and  thought  and  habit.  The  one  based 
all  his  reasoning  upon  fundamental  principles  of  right 
and  wrong,  and  these  were  of  divine  original.  The 
other  drew  his  criterion  of  argument  and  duty  from  the 
obligations  of  the  human  law.  While  one  asked,  "Is 
it  right?"  it  was  the  sole  inquiry  of  the  other  "Is  it 


318  CALIFORNIA    ANTHOLOGY. 

• 

legal?"  The  discourse  of  Webster  is  pervaded  and 
illuminated  by  a  living  faith;  the  speech  of  Calhoun  is 
cold,  and  stern,  and  rayless.  Taking  for  its  first  prin 
ciples  the  fundamental  compact  among  men,  it  argues 
up  to  this  with  unerring  accuracy  and  iron  logic.  Yet, 
by  a  seeming  paradox,  though  Webster,  in  his  private 
life,  did  frequent  violence  to  the  faith  he  professed,  Cal 
houn,  on  the  contrary,  practiced  the  habit  of  severest 
virtue.  He,  of  Massachusetts,  gave  a  liberal  indul 
gence  to  his  appetites  and  passions,  while  the  Caro 
linian  lived  in  asceticism  the  most  rigid,  a  recluse  from 
all  indulgence.  Here  ends  the  parallel:  In  powers  of 
mind  the  most  exalted,  in  patriotism  the  most  indexi 
ble,  and  in  devotion  to  the  service  of  their  country 
which  endured  unto  the  last,  these  master  spirits  stand 
in  strong  resemblance,  and  to  each  the  dying  hour  was 
bright  with  the  radiance  of  immortal  hope. — Joseph  W. 
Winans. 


DICKENS    IN  CAMP. 

258.- 

Above  the  pines  the  moon  was  slowly  drifting, 

The  river  sang  below; 
The  dim  Sierras  far  beyond  uplifting 
•  Their  minarets  of  snow. 

The  roaring  camp-fire,  with  rude  humor,  painted 

The  ruddy  tints  of  health 
On  haggard  face   and   form  that  dooped  and  fainted 

In  the  fierce  race  for  wealth. 


DISTINGUISHED    MEN.  319 

Till  one  arose,  and  from  his  pack's  scant  treasure, 

A  hoarded  volume  drew, 
And  cards  were  dropped  from  hands  of  listless  leisure, 

To  hear  the  tale  anew; 

And  then,  while  round  them  shadows  gathered  faster, 

And  as  the  firelight  fell, 
He  read  aloud  the  book  wherein  the  master 

Had  writ  of  "Little  Nell." 

Perhaps  'twas  boyish  fancy — for  the  reader 

Was  youngest  of  them  all — 
But  as  he  read,  from  clustering  pine  and  cedar, 

A  silence  seemed  to  fall; 

The  fir-trees,  gathering  closer  in  the  shadows, 

Listened  in  every  spray, 

While  the  whole  camp  with  "Nell"  on  English  mead 
ows 

Wandered,  and  lost  their  way. 

And  so  in  mountain  solitudes — o'ertaken 

As  by  some  spell  divine — 
Their  cares  drop  from  them  like  the  needles  shaken 

From  out  the  gusty  pine. 

Lost  is  that  camp,  and  wasted  all  its  fire! 

And  he  who  wrought  that  spell  ? 
Ah,  towering  pine  and  stately  Kentish  spire, 

Ye  have  one  tale  to  tell! 

Lost  is  that  camp!  but  let  its  fragrant  story 

Blend  with  the  breath  that  thrills 
With  hop-vine's  incense  all  the  pensive  glory 

That  fills  the  Kentish  hills. 


320  CALIFORNIA   ANTHOLOGY. 

And  on  that  grave  where  English  oak  and  holly 

And  laurel  leaves  entwine, 
Deem  it  not  all  a  too-presumptuous  folly— 

This  spray  of  Western  pine! 

— F.  Bret  Harte. 


HENRY  DURANT. 

(FOUNDER  OF  THE  UNIVERSITY  or  CALIFORNIA,  AND  WHO  SELECTED  TUB  BITE  OP  BERKELEY.— EDITOR.) 

289.  So  simple  and  unpretending  was  this  man, 
so  unobtrusive  and  so  modest,  that  it  will  astonish  many 
when  I  predict  for  him  a  longer  and  greater  future  than 
for  any  man  who  has  yet  come  to  our  shores.  It  seems 
to  me  that  when  men  who  living,  have  attracted  much 
more  attention  than  he,  are  forgotten,  as  if  they  had 
never  lived  his  memory  will  grow  fresher  and  greener 
with  every  succeding  year;  that,  like  the  wine  of 
California,  which  is  said  to  lose  its  earthy  taste  when 
transported  from  its  native  soil,  he  will  lose  whatever 
gave  to  him  mortal  appearance  in  the  long  lapse  of 
years. 

To  his  cultured  mind  everything  that  man  had 
thought,  everything  that  man  is  thinking  now,  was  full 
of  interest.  There  was  in  him  none  of  that  spirit  which 
would  throw  a  Galileo  into  prison,  or  clip  the  wings 
of  a  Newton  to  prevent  his  flight  among  the  stars. 
He  delighted  to  sit  with  Plato  at  the  feet  of  Socrates. 

o 

He  delighted  to  let  his  imagination  roam  with  the  old 

O  O 

poets,   and  with  them  see  a  god  in  every  hill  and  a 
nymph  in  every  tree.      He  was  glad   that  the   learned 


DISTINGUISHED    MEN.  321 

men  who  are  now  living  are  giving-  their  lives  to  bold, 
unfettered  thought,  and  he  believed  that  the  result 
of  their  deep  and  reverential  meditation  would  eventu 
ally  be  to  show  that  revelation  and  profoundest  philoso 
phy  were  but  different  roads  to  the  same  great  truths. 
He  knew,  for  his  studies  had  taught  him,  that  the  argu 
ment,  apparently  the  most  unanswerable,  might  hide  a 
fallacy  which  would  take  ages  of  profound  thought  to 
disclose;  and  when  any  system  of  philosophy  denied, 
or  even  led  up  to  a  doubt  of  the  great  religious  truths 
which  he  learned  in  childhood,  he  waited  patiently  to 
discover  the  error. 

In  the  freedom  of  thought  which  he  allowed  himself 
and  which  he  considered  right,  I  have  no  doubt  that 
there  were  times  when  his  mind  was  agitated — when 
doubts,  spite  of  himself,  would  creep  in — when  the  ar 
gument  so  ingeniously  put  would  leave  him  for  the 
moment  without  an  answer.  But  still  he  remained 
steadfast  to  his  early  faith.  Like  one  of  those  stately 
ships  in  our  harbor,  tossing  and  straining,  yet  riding 
securely  on  the  waves;  so  he,  though  the  winds  shook 
him,  and  the  seas  dashed  over  him,  still  rode  securely, 
and  the  anchor  of  his  faith  and  hope  never  dragged! 

Standing  on  the  heights  of  Berkeley,  he  heard  the 
distant  generations  hail,  and  saw  them  arise,  "demand 
ing  life,  impatient  for  the  skies,"  from  what  were  then 
fresh,  unbounded  wildernesses — from  the  shore  of  ^he 
great  tranquil  sea.  He  welcomed  them  to  the  treasures 
of  science  and  the  delights  of  learning,  to  the  immeas 
urable  good  of  rational  existence,  the  immortal  hopes 
of  Christianity,  the  lights  of  everlasting  truth ! 


322  CALIFORNIA    ANTHOLOGY. 

And  so,  hero  and  sage,  the  memory  of  whose  friend 
ship  raises  me  in  my  own  esteem,  I  love  to  think  of 
thee!  I  love  to  think  of  thee  thus  standing  on  the 
hights  of  Berkeley,  with  strong  emotion  lighting  thy 
features,  and  the  cry,  "Eureka!"  on  thy  lips,  as  thy  gaze 
goes  through  the  Golden  Gate  to  the  broad  Pacific 
Ocean  beyond.  And  I  love  to  think  of  thee  when,  in 
other  and  sadder  times,  I  have  seen  thee  stand  on  the 
hights  of  thine  own  self-raised  character,  pointing 
through  the  Golden  Gate  of  Death  to  the  Pacific  Ocean 
of  Eternity  dimly  seen  beyond  it. — John  B.  Fclton. 

26O.  HE  WAS  pre-eminently  a  scholar.  And  this 
means,  first,  that  he  was  a  lover  of  all  learning.  He 
welcomed  truth  wherever  found.  His  attitude  toward 
it  was  not  passive,  but  active.  He  went  after  it;  he 
sought  it  eagerly,  on  beaten  highways  and  shaded  by 
ways,  in  every  nook  and  hiding-place.  He  sought  it  on 
the  side  of  man  and  on  the  side  of  nature,  not  for 
getting  the  relations  of  both  to  the  God  above  both. 
He  was  never  afraid  of  the  truth. 

And  so  he  became  an  adept  in  learning — in  language 
— that  is,  in  the  expression  of  man's  thought ,  and 
God's  also,  in  revelation.  He  had  stores  of  philosophical 
learning.  He  had  powers  of  curious  combination, 
rare  felicity  of  expression;  this,  both  in  interpretation 
and  in  origination.  There  were  terms  of  expression 
that  threw  unexpected  light  on  a  point  in  question. 
He  used  words  with  meanings  hitherto  unrecognized; 
but  so  apt  that  the  world  seemed  dull  in  not  having 
discovered  them. 


DISTINGUISHED    MEN.  323 

He  was  an  adept  in  thought,  which  is  what  language 
is  good  for.  Any  man  that  is  fond  of  Plato  may  be 
called  a  lover  of  thought.  Durant  made  Plato  a  special, 
life-long  study. 

He  was  an  adept  in  science.  He  had  an  open  eye, 
quick  to  read  the  outer  as  well  as  the  inner  world.  He 
was  an  adept  in  oratory;  he  sometimes  spoke  in  such 
fashion  as  to  enchant  and  thrill.  He  was  almost  an 
adept  in  authorship.  Alas!  for  the  "almost."  I  know 
of  generous,  far-reaching  plans  in  that  direction,  which 
he  never  fulfilled.  He  was  too  busy  with  other  work. 
Multitudinous  cares  and  the  very  wealth  of  his  aspira 
tions  combined  to  thwart  his  plans — and  we  are  so 
much  the  poorer.  We  know  how  much  Horace  Bush- 
nell,  the  classmate  and  intimate  acquaintance  of  Durant, 
has  accomplished  as  an  author;  and  I  doubt  if  his 
mind  was  more  suggestive,  more  fertile  in  ideas,  than 
Durant's.  He  had  more  concentration  of  purpose, 
more  fortunate  surroundings.  But  who  shall  say  that 
even  he  has  done  a  nobler  life-work  ?  Durant  had 
power,  not  only  as  a  scholar  and  a  benefactor,  but  as  an 
example.  He  was  so  lofty  in  his  aims;  .so  unworldly, 
while  yet  notunpracticed;  so  modest,  so  pure,  so  noble, 
altogether  so  grand  a  pattern  of  a  man.  When  the 
students  saw  one,  so  advanced  in  life,  so  scholarly  in 
habit,  go  into  the  rugged  Winter  of  Esmeralda,  and 
share  the  hardships  of  the  poorest  miner,  not  to  make 
money  for  himself,  but  to  make  money  for  his  darling 
College,  they  could  not  but  catch  something  of  his  spirit 
of  self-denial,  of  devotion  to  a  noble  cause. 

To  some  his  memory  will  remain  as  an  inspiration 


324  CALIFORNIA   ANTHOLOGY. 

to  all  things  whatsoever  that  are  true  and  lovely  and  of 
good  report.  And  when  this  generation  has  passed 
quite  away;  when  colleagues  and  co-workers,  pupils 
and  admirers,  have  all  followed  him  to  the  grave,  his 
work  will  remnin.  It  will  remain  in  the  institutions  of 
high  culture,  for  which  he  toiled  to  prepare  a  foundation; 
in  the  loftiness  of  purpose  which  shall  ennoble  some  of 
the  best  leaders  of  the  "good  time  coming;"  in  the 
blended  beauty  and  strength  of  character  to  which  tie 
contributed  in  the  forming  period  of  California's  higher 
and  better  life. — Prof.  Martin  Kellogg. 


STEPHEN   J.  FIELD. 

261.  Like  most  men  who  have  risen  to  distinction  in 
the  United  States,  Judge  Field  commenced  his  career 
without  the  advantages  of  wealth,  and  he  prosecuted  it 
without  the  factitious  aids  of  family  influence  or  patro 
nage.  He  had  the  advantage,  however — which  served 
him  better  than  wealth  or  family  influence — of  an  ac 
complished  education,  and  careful  study  and  mental 
discipline.  He  brought  to  the  practice  of  his  profes 
sion  a  mind  stored  with  professional  learning,  and 
embellished  with  rare  scholarly  attainments.  He 
was  distinguished  at  the  bar  for  his  fidelity  to  his 
clients,  for  untiring  industry,  great  care  and  accu 
racy  in  the  preparation  of  his  cases,  uncommon  legal 
acumen,  and  extraordinary  solidity  of  judgment. 
As  an  adviser,  no  man  had  more  the  confidence  of  his 
clients,  for  he  trusted  nothing  to  chance  or  accident 


DISTINGUISHED    MEN.  325 

when  certainty  could  be  attained,  and  felt  his  way 
cautiously  to  his  conclusions,  which,  once  reached, 
rested  upon  sure  foundations,  and  to  which  he  clung 
with  remarkable  pertinacity.  Judges  soon  learned  to 
repose  confidence  in  his  opinions,  and  he  always  gave 
them  the  strongest  proofs  of  the  weight  justly  due  to 
his  conclusions. 

When  he  came  to  the  bench,  from  various  un 
avoidable  causes  the  calendar  was  crowded  with  cases 
involving  immense  interests,  the  most  important  ques 
tions,  and  various  and  peculiar  litigation.  California 
was  then,  as  now,  in  the  development  of  her  multiform 
physical  resources.  The  judges  were  as  much  pioneers 
of  law  as  the  people  of  settlement.  To  be  sure  some 
thing  had  been  done,  but  much  had  yet  to  be  accom 
plished;  and  something,  too,  had  to  be  undone  of  that 
which  had  been  done  in  the  feverish  and  anomalous 
period  that  had  preceded.  It  is  safe  to  say  that,  even 
in  the  experience  of  new  countries  hastily  settled  by 
heterogeneous  crowds  of  strangers  from  all  countries, 
no  such  example  of  legal  or  judicial  difficulties  was 
ever  before  presented  as  has  been  illustrated  in  the 
history  of  California.  There  was  no  general  or  com 
mon  source  of  jurisprudence.  Law  was  to  be  ad 
ministered  almost  without  a  standard.  There  was 
the  civil  law,  as  adulterated  or  modified  by  Mexican 
provincialism,  usages,  and  habitudes,  for  a  great  part  of 
the  litigation;  and  there  was  the  common  law  for  an 
other  part,  but  what  that  was  was  to  be  decided  from 
the  conflicting  decisions  of  any  number  of  courts  in 
America  and  England,  and  the  various  and  diverse 


326  CALIFORNIA   ANTHOLOGY. 

considerations  of  policy  arising  from  local  and  other 
facts.  And  then,  contracts  made  elsewhere,  and  some 
of  them  in  semi-civilized  countries,  had  to  be  inter 
preted  here.  Besides  all  which  may  be  added  that 
large  and  important  interests  peculiar  to  the  State 
existed — mines,  ditches,  etc. — for  which  the  courts  were 
compelled  to  frame  the  law,  and  make  a  system  out  of 
what  was  little  better  than  chaos. 

When,  in  addition,  it  is  considered  that  an  unprece 
dented  number  of  contracts,  and  an  amount  of  business 
without  parallel,  had  been  made  and  done  in  hot  haste, 
with  the  utmost  carelessness;  that  legislation  was  ac 
complished  in  the  same  way,  and  presented  the  crudest 
and  most  incongruous  materials  for  construction;  that 
the  whole  scheme  and  organization  of  the  government, 
and  the  relation  of  the  departments  to  each  other,  had 
to  be  adjusted  by  judicial  construction — it  may  well  be 
conceived  what  task  even  the  ablest  jurist  would  take 
upon  himself  when  he  assumed  this  office.  It  is  no 
small  compliment  to  say  that  Judge  Field  entered  upon 
the  duties  of  this  great  trust  with  his  usual  zeal  and 
energy,  and  that  he  left  the  office  not  only  with 
greatly  increased  reputation,  but  that  he  raised  the 
character  of  the  jurisprudence  of  the  State.  He  has 
more  than  any  other  man  given  tone,  consistency,  and 
system  to  our  judicature,  and  laid  broad  and  deep  the 
fountain  of  our  civil  and  criminal  law.  The  land  titles 
of  the  State — the  most  important  and  permanent  of  the 
interests  of  a  great  commonwealth — have  received  from 
his  hand  their  permanent  protection,  and  this  alone 


DISTINGUISHED    MEN.  327 

should  entitle  him  to  the  lasting  gratitude   of  the  bar 
and  the  'people. 

His  opinions,  whether  for  their  learning,  logic,  or 
diction,  will  compare  favorably,  in  the  judgment  of 
some  of  our  best  lawyers,  with  those  of  any  judge 
upon  the  Supreme  Bench  of  the  Union.  It  is  true 
what  he  has  accomplished  has  been  done  with  labor; 
but  this  is  so  much  more  to  his  praise,  for  such  work  was 
not  to  be  hastily  done,  and  it  was  proper  that  the  time 
spent  in  perfecting  the  work  should  bear  some  little 
proportion  to  the  time  it  should  last.  We  know  it  has 
been  said  of  Judge  Field  that  he  is  too  much  of  a 
'case  lawyer,'  and  not  sufficiently  broad  and  compre 
hensive  in  his  views.  This  criticism  is  not  just.  It  is 
true  he  is  reverent  of  authority,  and  likes  to  be  sus 
tained  by  precedent;  but  an  examination  of  his  opinions 
will  show  that,  so  far  from  being  a  timid  copyist,  or  the 
passive  slave  of  authority,  his  rulings  rest  upon  clearly 
defined  principles  and  strong  common  sense. — Judge 
Joseph  G.  Baldwin. 


HENRY  H.  HAIGHT. 

262.  In  this  age,  when  scepticism,  if  not  fashion 
able,  is  certainly  not  wholly  unfashionable,  and  when 
often  the  sceptic  thinks  warranted  in  becoming  a  scoffer, 
there  is  something  refreshing  in  the  spectacle  of  a  man 
of  acknowledged  integrity,  high  cultivation  and  intelli 
gence,  who  publicly  avows  that  in  respect  of  the  rela 
tions  of  man  to  his  God  he  has  attained  to  the  condi- 


328  CALIFORNIA   ANTHOLOGY. 

tion  of  an  absolute  belief,  and  that  he  is  ready  and  wil 
ling  to  carry  this  belief  out — not  only  in  theory,  but  in 
action — to  its  remotest  results.  Governor  Haight  had 
attained  to  this  condition.  He  early  adopted  the  faith 
of  a  Calvinistic  Presbyterian,  never  wavered  from  it, 
and  was  at  the  time  of  his  death  an  ordained  elder  of 
that  church.  He  accepted  that  belief  with  all  its 
duties;  he  was  faithful  to  it,  not  only  in  his  family,  but 
also  in  all  the  forms  into  which  it  ramified  itself;  in  the 
church,  the  bible  class,  the  Sunday-school,  and  in  every 
collateral  organization  and  enterprise.  He  was  not 
obtrusively  demonstrative  in  his  profession  of  faith,  and 
yet  his  conduct  left  no  one  in  doubt  what  it  was.  If 
challenged,  the  answer  was  sharp  and  ringing.  It  is 
pleasing  to  hear  his  religious  associates  speak  with  deep 
affection  of  the  reliance  they  placed  on  him  for  judi 
cious  counsel,  for  support  in  crises  of  difficulty,  for  ready 
material  relief  in  times  of  great  exigency.  His  was  a 
faith  so  anchor-bound  to  the  idea  of  duty,  that  in  other 
times  he  might  have  emulated  some  of  the  early  Chris 
tian  martyrs,  and  have  accepted,  with  equal  readiness, 
the  mitre  of  an  archbishop,  or  death  at  the  stake  as  a 
missionary  to  the  Iroquois. 

He  did  not  possess  merely  a  few  good  and  exalted 
qualities,  nor  was  his  character  marred  by  great  defects, 
but  it  was  well  rounded.  He  possessed  many  good 
qualities  in  a  great  degree  of  excellence,  and  if  any  de 
fects  existed  in  his  character,  they  were  so  few  and  so 
small  that  they  were  not  apparent  to  the  general  ob 
server.  And  when  we  have  said  that  his  character  was 
excellent,  we  have  said  all  that  is  claimed  for  that  of 


DISTINGUISHED    MEN.  329 

Washington  himself.  He  was  good;  he  was  sympa 
thetic;  he  was  kind;  he  was  learned;  he  was  perspica 
cious;  he  was  honest;  he  was  trustworthy ;  he  was  re 
ligious;  he  was  faithful.  From  the  many  public  tri 
butes  which  have  been  offered  to  his  memory,  there 
comes  up  the  audible  and  distinct  utterance  of  one  word 
which  embodies  the  greatest  encomium  which  could  be 
passed  upon  his  character;  and  if  a  monument  were 
erected  to  him,  and  upon  its  base  were  inscribed  that 
one  word,  it  would  suggest  the  greatest  eulogy  we  could 
pronounce  upon  him  as  a  man,  a  professor  of  religion, 
a  lawyer,  and  the  Governor  of  our  State — FIDELITY. 

— John  W.  Dwinelle. 


OLIVER  WENDELL  HOLMES. 

263.  In  the  choir  of  American  poecs,  distinguished 
in  many  respects  above  the  rest — in  limpidity  of  tone 
and  variety  of  expression  beyond  rivalry — stands  Oliver 
Wendell  Holmes.  In  him  the  freshness  and  variety  of 
nature  unite  with  the  brilliance  and  finish  of  consum 
mate  art.  From  youth  to  age,  breathing  an  atmos 
phere  of  literary  taste  and  achievement,  he  has  shown 
how  little  real  incompatibility  there  is  between  the 
pursuits  of  the  scientist  and  the  artist.  For  more  than 
thirty  years,  professor  of  anatomy  and  physiology,  in 
the  leading  American  college — a  position  demanding 
in  the  occupant  the  keen  scrutiny,  the  profound 
thought,  and  rigid  deductions  of  the  scientist — he 
has  yet  found  and  improved  opportunities  for  frequent 


330  CALIFORNIA    ANTHOLOGY. 

excursions  into  the  realms  of  imagination  and  philoso 
phy.  As  poet,  novelist,  essayist,  critic,  causcur,  he  is 
familiarly  known  to  many  who  are  oblivious  of  his 
life-long  studies,  labors,  and  achievements  in  the  fields 
of  science.  In  poetry  or  prose, — whether  touching  the 
lightest  themes  of  the  hour,  or  discussing  the  awful 
problems  of  man's  origin  and  destiny, — drawing  a 
satiric  sketch  of  New  England  life  and  character,  or 
limning  in  never-fading  colors  the  traits  of  universal 
humanity — he  is  ever  master  of  his  subject.  There  is 
no  crudity  of  idea  or  of  phrase.  Beauty  of  conception 
shines  through  his  clear-cut,  diamond-pointed  sentences, 
every  one  of  which  is  a  refutation  of  the  famous  saying 
attributed  to  Talleyrand  respecting  the  use  of  language. 
Of  him,  as  of  his  great  Irish  name-sake,  the  author  of 
"  The  Vicar  of  Wakefield,"  and  "  The  Deserted  Vil 
lage,"  "  She  Stoops  to  Conquer,"  and  "  The  Citizen  of 
the  World,"  it  may  be  said,  Nihil  tetigit  quod  non 
ornavit.  An  attempt  to  deepen  the  impression  or 
heighten  the  admiration  felt  by  the  student  of  American 
literature  for  him — the  highest  type  of  New  England 
"  Brahminism"  -would  too  much  resemble  the  pro 
verbial  folly  of  painting  the  lily  or  gilding  refined  gold. 
To  characterize,  with  discriminating  judgment  and 
accuracy  of  phrase,  a  genius  so  unique  and  so  versatile, 
were  a  task  requiring  an  acuteness  of  insight  and  appre 
hension,  a  cultivation  of  taste,  and  a  pen  possessing  a 
grace,  kindred  to  his  own.  A  literary  critic  like  Sainte- 
Beuve,  and  a  literary  artist  like  Th^ophile  Gautier, 
uniting  their  talents  and  special  gifts,  alone  could  give 
just  estimate  and  fitting  expression  of  Holmes'  char- 


DISTINGUISHED    MEN.  331 

acter  and  genius.  Sentiment,  the  deepest  and  the 
most  delicate;  wit,  the  most  brilliant;  insight  into  the 
human  mind  and  heart,  the  most  subtile ;  modes  of 
expression  the  happiest  and  most  graceful,  find  brightest 
illustrations  iri  the  pages  of  this  nineteenth  century 
literary  magician.  Admirable  as  he  is  in  the  com 
moner  walks  of  life  and  letters,  it  is  as  a  poet  that  he 
will  live  forever  in  the  history  of  literature.  When 
obscurity  and  profundity  shall  cease  to  be  regarded  as 
synonymous,  when  quality  rather  than  quantity  of  work 
shall  determine  an  author's  rank,  the  brightness  and 
brevity  of  Holmes'  verse  will  be  in  some  measure 
appreciated ;  and  then  fully  by  those  choice  spirits 
only,  who,  in  exalted  moods,  look  through 

"  Charm'd  magic  casements,  opening  on  the  foam 
Of  perilous  seas,  on  faery  lands  forlorn." 

— Henry  H.  Reid. 


EDWARD  JENNER. 

264.  Medicine  has  canonized  him — benevolence 
claims  him  as  essentially  her  own.  Run  back  through 
all  the  pages  of  history,  back  further  yet,  until  the 
bright  light  of  history,  growing  indistinct,  is  gradually 
merged  in  the  sombre  twilight  of  fable;  ransack  the 
records  of  philanthropy,  dive  deeply  in  the  musty  tomes 
or  more  modern  volumes  that  commemorate  the  lives 
and  deeds  of  those  who  loved  their  fellow  men,  and 
made  that  love  in  all  respects  practical,  and  you  will 

see  high  above  them  all,  shining  in  solitary  splendor, 
22 


332  CALIFORNIA    ANTHOLOGY. 

burning,  blazing  in  immortal  light,  the  mighty  name  of 
Jcnner;  and  the  century  in  which  he  was  born,  teeming 
with  great  events  as  it  undoubtedly  was,  can  show  none 
that  can  compare  with  his  discovery.  There  were  dread 
ful  wars  and  frightful  revolutions,  the  demolition  of 
monarchies  and  the  establishment  of  empires;  colonial 
rebellion,  struggles  for  freedom  and  the  acquisition  of 
liberty,  all  of  which  involved  the  destruction  of  human 
life;  and  just  when  the  century  was  closing,  came  his 
discovery,  a  bloodless,  glorious  triumph,  a  deathless 
victory,  redeeming,  in  some  measure,  the  past — its  sole 
object  the  salvation  of  the  human  family.  The  most 
terrible  scourge  that  has  ever  afflicted  mankind,  which 
in  one  century,  in  Europe  alone,  destroyed  45,000,000 
of  lives,  a  distemper  in  itself  and  surroundings  horri 
ble,  drying  up  the  wells  of  sympathy,  overwhelming 
the  maternal  instinct — so  hard  to  weaken,  almost  im 
possible  to  destroy — driving  the  mother  from  her 
stricken  child ;  this  is  the  pestilence  that  the  genius  of 
Jenner  has  robbed  of  all  its  terrors;  and  medicine  to 
day,  in  the  exhibition  of  all  her  marvellous  possessions, 
•cannot  show  any  prophylactic  measures  against  the  in 
vasion  of  a  serious  malady  to  be  at  all  compared  with 
vaccination.  So  much  can  be  said  of  Jenner's  dis 
covery  ;  it  has  given  science  complete,  absolute  mastery 
over  one  most  disastrous  plague — others  remain,  bid 
ding  defiance  to  the  science  and  the  art  of  medicine, 
darkening  the  world  wherever  and  whenever  their 
frightful  presence  is  made  manifest.  Vaccination  is  in 
deed  the  Sacrament  of  medicine,  omnipotent  to  save, 
and  the  dreadful  rumors  of  variolous  visitations  here 


DISTINGUISHED    MEN.  333 

and  there  over  the  world  weaken  not  our  reverence  and 
love  for  Jenner,  or  our  faith  in  his  discovery;  they  only 
serve  to  demonstrate  the  criminal  blindness,  the  culpa 
ble  stupidity  and  inexplicable  negligence  of  mankind. 
Jenner  idolized  his  discovery.  In  his  persecutions  and 
imminent  rnartrydom  the  reflection  of  what  untold  bene 
fit  it  was  ultimately  to  be  to  the  human  family,  upheld 
and  consoled  him;  he  predicted,  as  the  final  result  of 
his  discovery,  the  entire  annihilation  of  small-pox,  and 
did  man  respond  with  a  zeal  commensurate  with  the 
importance  of  the  measure  to  the  necessity  of  faithfully 
following  the  precepts  of  its  great  author,  we  might  all 
see  the  prediction  realized  and  this  most  loathsome  dis 
ease  swept  from  the  face  of  God's  fair  earth  forever. 

— Dr.  J.  Campbell  Shorb. 


THOMAS  STARR  KING. 

("  RELIEVING  GUARD MARCH  4TH,    1 864.") 

265.- 

Came  the  Relief.     "What,  Sentry,  ho! 
Mow  passed  the  night  through  thy  long  waking?" 
"Cold,  cheerless,  dark, — as  may  be  fit 
The  hour  before  the  dawn  is  breaking." 

"No  sight,  no  sound?"     "No;  nothing  save 
The  plover  from  the  marshes  calling; 
And  in  you  Western  sky,  about 
An  hour  ago,  a  Star  was  falling." 


334  CALIFORNIA   ANTHOLOGY. 

"A  star  ?     There's  nothing  strange  in  that." 
"No,  nothing;  but,  above  the  thicket, 
Somehow  it  seemed  to  me  that  God 
Somewhere  had  just  relieved  a  picket!" 

— Frank  Bret  Harte. 
266.- 

CHASTE  AS  the  fleecy  pillow  of  a  star, 
And  purely  pale  as  angel  watchers  are, 
Shines  the  clear  porcelain  of  your  magic  bowl 
Till  red  bright  wine  is  poured  into  its  soul. 
Then  lo!  a  luxury  of  vines  and  flowers, 
Of  wildwood  wreaths  and  foliage-tangled  bowers, 
A  blest  profusion  of  enchanted  things, 
Gladden  its  side  in  fairy  pencilings. 
So,  when  the  wine  of  genius  and  of  life- 
Its  taste  with  sweets,  its  breath  with  fragrance  rife — 
Filled  up  the  measure  of  thy  years  on  earth, 
And  Manhood's  crown  had  followed  Childhood's  mirth, 
All  we  that  gazed  upon  that  life  complete, 
Found  glorious  Beauty  there  the  soul  to  greet — 
Found  Truth  and  Sweetness,  Nobleness  and  Grace; 
Found  Love  of  Country  and  the  Human  Race. 
The  bowl  is  broken,  and  the  wine  is  poured; 
Stricken  the  wing  that  to  the  sun  blaze  soared; 
And  Genius  mourns  her  gentlest,  brightest  son, 
And  Eloquence  her  grand  and  peerless  one. 
Whilst  she,  Columbia,  only  calms  her  woe, 
To  rouse  our  drooping  hearts  with  patriot  glow: 
"O  ye,  my  children,  faster  by  my  side 
Stand  ye  henceforth,  since  he  is  gone,  my  pride ! " 

— Charles  Russell  Clarke. 


DISTINGUISHED  MEN.  335 

ON  A  PEN  OF  THOMAS  STARR  KING. 
267.— 

THIS  is  the  reed  the  dead  musician  dropped, 
With  tuneful  magic  in  its  sheath  still  hidden; 
The  prompt  allegro  of  its  music  stopped, 
Its  melodies  unbidden. 

But  who  shall  finish  the  unfinished  strain, 
Or  wake  the  instrument  to  awe  and  wonder, 
And  bid  the  slender  barrel  breathe  again,- — 
An  organ-pipe  of  thunder  ? 

His  pen!     What  humbler  memories  cling  about 
Its  golden  curves!     What  shapes  and  laughing  graces 
Slipped  from  its  point,  when  his  full  heart  went  out 
In  smiles  and  courtly  phrases! 

The  truth,  half-jesting,  half  in  earnest  flung; 
The  word  of  cheer,  with  recognition  in  it; 
The  note  of  alms,  whose  golden  speech  outrung 
The  golden  gift  within  it. 

But  all  in  vain  the  enchanter's  wand  we  wave: 
No  stroke  of  ours  recalls  his  magic  vision; 
The  incantation  that  its  power  gave 
Sleeps  with  the  dead  magician. 

—J.  Bret  Harte. 

LAFAYETTE. 

268.  Animated  by  the  same  feeling  that  prompts 
the  maiden  to  lay  aside,  in  her  vows  to  religion  and 
charity,  the  shining  locks  her  fond  mother  tended,  her 
vain  girlhood  prized,  and  the  voice  of  affection  praised, 
Lafayette,  a  boy  of  nineteen,  sacrificed  upon  the  stern 


336  CALIFORNIA   ANTHOLOGY. 

altar  of  freedom  the  brilliant  gifts  with  which  propitious 
fortune  adorned  his  birth.  To  love  one's  own  country 
is  but  obeying  the  instinct  of  the  heart — it  is  sweet  to 
die  for  our  fatherland.  The  blood  quickens,  the  eye 
illumines,  and  the  arms  grow  strong,  when  the  ruthless 
hand  of  enmity  would  pluck  one  honor  from  the  flag  of 
one's  country,  or  rob  her  children  of  one  right  of  their 
inheritance.  But  how  much  more  exalted  is  that  spirit 
that  weeps  over  the  wrongs  of  the  great  heart  of  hu 
manity  without  regard  to  place  or  clime  ?  Lafayette 
worshipped  the  Genius  of  Freedom,  and  defended  her 
votaries  wherever  the  sun  of  a  beneficent  Creator 
shone.  Born  to  titles  of  nobility,  to  claims  on  kings 
and  great  men,  to  wealth,  to  honor,  to  opportunities  of 
distinction,  to  domestic  happiness  and  precocious  talent, 
he  laid  these  things  of  earth  in  the  dust,  and  scorned 
them  as  little  worth,  when  compared  with  an  enthusi 
astic  love  and  sacred  veneration  for  the  rights  of  hu 
manity  and  the  equalities  of  life.  Who  among  us,  with 
all  the  gifts  of  fortune  and  power,  the  smiles  of  beauty, 
the  happiness  of  home,  would  sacrifice  them  while  life 
was  vigorous,  and  the  stream  of  youth  bedewed  the 
freshly  springing  flowers  along  its  course,  to  struggle 
for  the  supremacy  of  a  cause  affecting  a  people  with 
whom  his  own  had  nothing  in  common  but  hereditary 
wrongs.  To  do  so  is  to  attain  the  highest  point  of 
human  greatness.  It  is  to  join  the  vanguard  in  the 
march  of  human  things.  From  the  humble  avocations 
of  life,  the  workshop,  the  forge,  the  laborer's  bench, 
oftentimes  spring  such  souls  as  these,  covered  with  the 
heat  and  dust  of  want,  galled  by  actual  necessity,  and 


DISTINGUISHED    MEN.  337 

smarting  under  the  hand  of  wrong,  and  who  force 
through  the  restraints  of  lowliness,  spurn  the  iron  heel 
of  dependence,  and  from  the  envious  crowd  rise  up 
erect,  calm,  self-possessed,  and  great  in  lofty  determina 
tion  of  purpose.  Another  order,  and  more  praiseworthy 
because  they  have  more  to  lose  by  failure,  are  those 
endowed  by  auspicious  fortune  with  all  the  attributes 
and  blessings  of  power  and  greatness;  who,  without  a 
stimulus  for  their  energies  other  than  the  noble  seed 
sown  in  their  blood  by  their  ancestors,  become  fore 
runners  in  the  advancement  and  elevation  of  their 
species.  To  this  latter  class  belonged  Lafayette,  ful 
filling  by  his  illustrious  life,  Socrates'  description  of  a 
great  man:  "  In  childhood  modest,  in  youth  temperate, 
in  manhood  just,  in  old  age  prudent." — Milton  S. 
Latham, 


MAXIMILIAN. 

269.  I  do  not  envy  him,  whatever  his  political 
feelings,  who  has  read  without  tears  the  last  scene  of 
the  tragedy  which  closed  with  the  death  of  Maximilian. 
Gallantly,  with  heroic  mien,  the  young  Prince  steps  for 
ward  to  his  fate.  The  executioners  stand  trembling 
before  the  undaunted  victim.  He  is  in  the  presence 
of  that  great  Democrat,  Death,  who  laughs  at  human 
distinctions.  His  place  is  in  the  center.  His  two 
friends  are  one  on  each  hand.  With  a  gesture  he  stays 
the  executioners.  He  is  still  monarch,  and  his  hand 
has  the  right  to  confer  honor,  though  on  the  brink  of 
the  tomb.  "I  belong  to  a  race,"  he  said,  "from  which 


338  CALIFORNIA    ANTHOLOGY. 

come  only  the  leaders  of  a  people,  or  their  martyrs.  A 
sovereign  has  the  right  to  recompense  services,  and 
you,  Miramon,  my  friend,  who  have  stood .  by  me 
through  life  so  faithfully,  take  in  death  from  my  hand 
the  last  honor  I  can  bestow.  Take  the  place  assigned 
to  your  monarch  to  die  in,  and  let  me  die  in  the  place 
allotted  to  you."  And  Miramon,  with  a  pride  exultant 
even  in  that  dread  moment,  bowed  gratefully  to  the 
monarch,  whom  death  was  powerless  to  dethrone. 
Whence  came  this  sublime  self-respect,  asserted  in  de 
fiance  of  death  itself?  The  pride  of  Maria  Theresa, 
caught  from  a  hundred  Hungarian  nobles  as  they 
shouted  "We  will  die  for  our  king,"  was  running 
through  his  veins;  the  old  traditions  of  a  family  that  felt 
itself  humiliated  when  Napoleon  became  one  of  its 
members,  had  cradled  him.  Well  he  knew  that  at  that 
moment,  when  the  executioners  were  pointing  their 
guns  with  horrible  aim  at  his  heart,  far  away,  in  the 
land  of  his  birth,  thousands  of  guns  were  presented  in 
honor  of  his  brother,  as  the  iron  crown  of  St.  Stephen 
was  descending  on  his  annointed  head.  He  belonged 
to  an  order  accustomed  to  read  in  the  faces  of  men,  as 
they  passed,  the  awe  and  respect  which  it  inspired,  and 
he  revered  himself  because  he  belonged  to  it.-  -John 
B.  Felton. 


THOMAS  MOORE. 

27O.  The  brilliancy  of  the  warrior,  the  gleam  of 
beauty,  and  the  triumphs  of  the  statesman  are  forgotten; 
their  names  perish  and  their  monuments  fall  to  decay; 
but  the  memory  and  works  of  the  great  National  Poet 


DISTINGUISHED    MEN.  339 

last  forever.  The  influence  of  poetry  upon  the  dim 
and  shadowy  outlines  of  the  past  is  unequalled.  When 
imagination  first  plumed  its  half-fledged  wing,  and 
passion  kindled  its  flame  within  the  heart  of  man,  the 
undying  power  of  this  offspring  of  sentiment  and  feel 
ing  began,  and  will  continue  among  men  until  the 
eternal  sunset  shall  fling  its  reddening  light  upon  the 
fragments  of  the  dissolving  world. 

In  the  mists  of  antiquity  Ireland  alone  among  na 
tions,  was  known  as  the  "  Island  of  song."  Literature, 
music  and  poetry  were  state  institutions.  The  people 
carefully  fostered  these  aids  to  civilization.  The  thread 
of  poetry  was  woven  into  all  the  occupations  of  the 
race.  Their  bards  constituted  one  of  the  most  honored 
classes  of  the  land.  They  were  its  lawyers,  its  musi 
cians,  its  historians,  and  its  genealogists.  Their  harp 
is  to-day  the  national  emblem.  In  peace  they  sung  of 
love  and  deeds  of  valor;  in  war,  accompanying  their 
kings,  they  incited  armies  to  heroic  achievements. 
When  their  country  was  enslaved,  they  clung  to  her, 
and  animated  her  children  to  remain  true  to  faith  and 
fatherland.  When  the  nobles  fled,  the  bards  remained, 
sealed  their  devotion  to  their  native  land  with  their 
blood,  and,  with  dying  lips,  crystalized  the  object  of 
their  existence  in  the  words,  "  Erin  forever." 

It  was  the  mission  of  Thomas  Moore,  to  revive  the 
poetry  and  music  of  Ireland.  He  found,  preserved  in 
the  unwritten  songs  of  his  countrymen,  the  character 
of  the  people,  their  legends,  their  traditions,  their 
superstitions,  their  love  for  the  past,  their  sorrows  in 
the  present,  and  their  lofty  aspirations  for  a  great  and 


340  CALIFORNIA    ANTHOLOGY. 

glorious  future.  Love,  loyalty,  religion,  constancy  and 
unswerving  devotion  for  the  fatherland  were  contained 
in  these  almost  forgotten  Celtic  airs,  which  roused  the 
spirit  and  chivalry  of  Erin's  greatest  bard  to  those 
displays  of  word-painting  and  harmonious  numbers 
that  have  made  his  name  synonymous  with  that  of  the 
Lyric  muse. 

What  is  poetry  ?  Poetry  is  the  mirror  of  nature, 
and  the  blossoming  of  the  soul.  The  elements  that 
enter  into  its  composition  are  invention,  memory  of  the 
past,  brilliant  imagination,  sensitiveness,  judgment  and 
the  power  of  expression,  evidenced  by  rich  language 
and  musical  feeling.  The  mind  of  a  poet  must  be  a 
lyre  that  continually  vibrates  to  the  joys  of  innocence, 
the  pangs  of  misery,  and  the  love  and  hate  of  men. 
It  should  be  at  one  moment  like  the  bright  sky;  at 
another  like  the  fleecy  cloud,  when,  under  the  influence 
of  the  sun,  it  sheds  its  brilliantly  tinted  tears.  His 
duty  it  is  to  call  on  men  to  behold  the  infinite  and 
indefinable  character  of  Omniscience.  In  a  word,  the 
intellect  of  a  true  poet  should  be  composed  of  all  that 
is  great,  noble,  learned  and  heroic;  and  his  thoughts, 
moreover,  should  be  resplendent  with  the  emeralds  and 
sapphires  of  a  gorgeous  fancy  glowing  upon  the  white 
bosom  of  truth  and  justice.  The  real  and  unreal, 
under  his  magic  prism,  in  assuming  varied  forms, 
should  display  all  the  hues  of  the  rainbow. 

If  these  tests  are  applied  to  the  poetical  works  of 
Moore,  they  will  be  found  possessed  of  all  the  neces 
sary  qualifications  in  an  eminent  degree.  His  name 


DISTINGUISHED    MEN.  341 

should  therefore  shine  forever  as  one  of  the  trinity  of 
poetical  luminaries  with  Byron  and  Scott. 

Contented  for  a  short  period  with  the  lyric  laurel,  he 
offered  his  Lalla  Rookh  on  the  altar  of  Fame.  Then 
criticism  placed  its  author  with  the  immortals.  With 
out  possessing  that  great  degree  of  sublimity,  passion 
and  nervousness  which  characterizes  Byron,  and  wanting 
to  its  full  extent  the  exciting,  descriptive,  spear-clashing 
narrative  of  Scott,  he  excelled  them  both  in  play  of 
fancy,  warmth  of  feeling,  honied  flow  of  verse  and 
splendor  of  imagery.  What  reader  of  English  poetry 
has  not  been  charmed  with  the  rise  and  fall  of  the 
words  in  Lalla  Rookh !  Does  not  the  rhythm  of  the 
verse  remind  him  of  the  dip  of  the  oar  in  the  blue  and 
placid  waters  of  some  quiet  bay  ?  Byron's  strength 
resembles  the  crash  of  the  Atlantic  wave  as  it  strikes 
the  shore ;  Moore's  the  sustained  tide  of  the  noble 
Shannon,  as  it  booms  along  its  banks. 

In  no  other  poem  of  the  language  are  such  dazzling 
similies  and  images  found  united  with  such  Tasso-like 
tenderness.  The  critical  eye  may  range  in  vain  through 
English  literature  for  such  exquisite  ideas  as  float  along 
the  melodious  stream  of  this  glorious  production.  The 
author  dipped  his  brush  in  the  most  brilliant  tints  of 
imagination,  without  sacrificing  his  love  for  truth.  The 
fame  of  this  work  is  circumscribed  only  by  the  globe. 
It  is  read  in  all  languages.  The  Persian  lover  claims 
it  as  his  own,  when,  in  the  soft  twilight  hour,  under  the 
curtained  balcony,  he  recites  its  burning  lines  to  his 
enchanted  mistress.  The  Pole,  fascinated  by  its  glow- 


342  CALIFORNIA   ANTHOLOGY. 

ing  thoughts,  believes  that  they  are  applicable  to  his 
historic  but  ill-fated  land.  Oh !  Bard  of  the  Green 
Isle,  these  are  thy  triumphs ! — Francis  J.  Sullivan. 

271.- 

ALL  HAIL  to  thee,  where'er  thy  home  be  now, 

All  hail  to  thee,  thou  soaring  soul  of  song! 

Before  thy  shrine  let  me  a  moment  bow, 

Thy  most  devoted  followers  among. 

To  fame's  eternal  galaxy  belong 

The  glorious  offspring  of  thy  teeming  brain, 

Which  on  the  mind  in  happy  tumult  throng. 

Lo!  Nature  opened  not  her  broad  domain 

In  panoramic  splendor  to  thine  eye,  in  vain. 

Like  gems  that  quicken  with  perennial  blaze, 
Thy  fancies  flash  along  each  burning  line — 
Truth,  virtue,  valor,  love,  devotion,  praise, 
Mantling  upon  each  page,  resplendent  shine, 
While  music  breathes  through  all  her  soul  divine. 
Music,  inspiring  and  inspired  power! 
The  heart's  intensest  ectasies  are  thine. 
Heaven  claims  thee  as  its  best  and  brightest  dower, 
And  where  thy  smile  doth  gleam,  no  angry  cloud  can 
lower. 

Poetic  impulse  never  yet  was  given 

In  swifter  volume  or  in  sweeter  flow 

Than  unto  thee,  whose  muse  at  founts  of  heaven 

Caught  drops  to  charm  the  cup  of  mortal  woe. 

Grief,  at  the  solace  which  thy  notes,  bestow, 

Trembles  with  hope,  and  lifts  her  tear- washed  eyes; 


DISTINGUISHED    MEN.  343 

While  faith,  inflamed,  with  visage  all  aglow, 
And  pinions  burnished  with  celestial  dyes, 
Beholds,  in  rapt  delight,  thy  fragrant  incense  rise! 

O,  for  a  spark  of  that  immortal  fire 

Which  fed  thy  soul  and  nerved  thy  plastic  hand, 

That  I  might  feebly  wake  the  lofty  lyre 

Which  glowed  with  symphony  at  thy  command! 

But  motionless,  in  silent  awe  I  stand, 

In  hushed  communion  with  its  breathing  strings. 

They  seem  to  woo  me  to  a  fairy  land, 

And  whisper  soft,  Earth  hath  no  mortal  stings 

For  the  aspiring  soul  that  soars  on  lyric  wings! 

— Oscar  T.  Shuck. 


NAPOLEON   BONAPARTE. 

272.  Who  that  has  ever  lived  had  a  more  indi 
vidual  peculiar  power  than  the  great  Napoleon  ?  Wrhat 
colossal  figure  in  history  stands  out  in  more  bold  relief? 
Yet  it  was  as  a  member  of  a  class  that  he  respected 
himself,  and  achieved  his  power.  It  was  to  that  class 
that  he  looked  for  his  reward.  Members  of  that  class 
from  all  ages  fired  his  ambition.  On  the  Alps,  Hanni 
bal  was  by  his  side,  spurring  him  on;  the  rivalry  of 
Caesar  and  Charlemagne  invited  him  to  unite  the  glory 
of  a  law-giver  and  orator  with  that  of  the  great  captain; 
and  when  mankind  had  paid  him  the  greatest  compli 
ment  he  ever  received — that  of  shutting  him  up  in  the 
stifling  cave  of  St.  Helena,  as  the  only  means  of  re 
pressing  his  terrible  energy — when  his  great  soul  was 


344  .      CALIFORNIA    ANTHOLOGY. 

1 

about  to  escape — "I  am  going,"  he  said,  to  "re-join 
Kleber,  Desaix,  Lannes,  Massena,  Bessieres,  Duroc, 
Ney;  they  will  come  to  meet  me;  they  will  feel  again 
the  intoxication  of  human  glory;  we  will  talk  of  what 
we  have  done;  we  will  commune  about  our  professions 
with  Frederic,  Turenne,  Conde,  Caesar,  Hannibal." 
Then,  interrupting  himself,  he  added  with  a  singular 
smile,  "unless,  indeed  above,  as  here  on  earth,  they  are 
afraid  of  seeing  so  many  soldiers  together."  Was  this 
last  remark  simply  in  irony  at  the  fears  of  those  who 
had  thus  surrounded  a  single  man  with  chains  and 
soldiers,  on  the  solitude  of  a  rock  in  mid-ocean?  Or 
was  that  audacious  mind  dwelling,  as  death  approached, 
on  the  possibility  of  some  new  eternal  theater  tor  his 
boundless  ambition — some  Titanic  enterprise  which 
would  again  enable  him  to  hurl  the  combined  thunder 
of  his  terrible  order? — John  B.  Felton. 


PLATO. 

273.  Plato,  on  the  Immortality  of  the  Soul,  will 
be  read,  consulted,  and  revered  by  millions  yet  unborn, 
when  legions  of  Christian  authors  on  the  same  theme 
will  have  passed  away  forever  from  the  recollection  of 
man.  No  matter  what  his  ideas  were  in  reference  to 
the  nature  of  the  Deity,  or  the  lesser  deities  of  his 
theology,  who  clustered  around  the  throne  of  the  Su 
preme  Good;  no  matter  what  his  conceptions  were  in 
relation  to  the  creation  of  the  material  world,  the  origin 


DISTINGUISHED    MEN.  345 

of  ideas,  and  the  pre-existent  state  of  the  soul,  its  im 
mortality  discovered  in  him  a  champion  whose  strength, 
like  the  momentum  of  a  falling  planet,  and  whose 
eloquence,  sweet  as  the  honey  of  Hymeltus,  struck 
widely  and  deeply  in  the  heart  of  Paganism,  giving  to 
faith  a  longevity  not  disturbed  by  death,  giving  to  hope 
amplest  assurance  of  celestial  satisfaction,  recreating 
that  sublime  philosophy  amid  the  trials  and  vicissitudes 
of  life,  that  splendid  indifference  to  death,  not  born  of 
brutish  insensibility,  which  characterized  the  conduct  of 
Cato  the  Younger  when  at  Utica  he  believed  that  with 
the  fall  of  Pompey  the  liberties  of  Rome  were  crushed 
forever.  The  gates  of  Plato's  heaven  opening  before 
his  enraptured  vision,  with  a  majesty  of  reliance  which 
no  terror  could  shake  or  doubt  disturb,  he  passed 
calmly  into  that  undiscovered  country  from  whose 
bourne  no  traveler  returns.  Such  was  the  influence  of 
Plato's  almost  Christian  philosophy  upon  a  noble  heart- 
Pagan  in  all  respects  save  in  its  faith  in  the  soul's  im 
mortality.  His  influence  was  not  ignored  by  grateful 
Athens,  who  saw  her  children  inspired  by  it,  grow 
virtuous  in  conduct,  wise  in  life,  and  brave  in  death; 
and  who  erected  to  the  memory  of  her  first  philoso 
pher  mighty  even  in  death,  a  temple,  statues  and  altars; 
and  cut  in  gems  defying  time,  which  even  to  this  day 
are  found  near  the  scene  of  his  great  labors  and  splendid 
triumphs,  the  features  of  his  divine  face,  the  cynosure 
of  the  Athenian  eye  two  thousand  years  ago.  His 
philosophy  was  not  for  his  day  and  generation  alone, 
not  for  to-day  or  to-morrow,  but  for  humanity  to  the 
end  of  time  and  the  beginning  of  eternity.  Would  to 


346  CALIFORNIA    ANTHOLOGY. 

God  that  in  this  cycle  of  irreligion,  infidelity  and  crime, 
some  such  master  spirit  could  arise,  even  from  the  ashes 
of  Paganism,  to  meet  and  vanguish  the  legions  of 
impious  and  blasphemous  teachers  who  cumber  the 
earth,  destructive  to  man  and  offensive  to  God. — Dr. 
y.  Campbell  Shorb. 


PRESCOTT  AND   MACAU  LAY. 

274.  When  one  passes  from  a  chapter  of  Macaulay 
to  Prescott,  he  perceives  an  unpleasant  thinness,  a 
watery  paleness.  The  opulence  of  language,  the  afflu 
ence,  the  Rubens  hues  of  Macaulay  make  him  feel  that 
Prescott  used  a  very  limited  dictionary.  But  when  a 
volume  of  each  has  been  read,  he  sees  how  vastly 
superior  to  Macaulay  is  the  thin-worded  Prescott  in 
opening  a  vista  through  the  tangled  wilderness  of  the 
politics  of  strange  lands.  In  the  arrangement  of  back 
grounds,  in  the  ability  to  secure  large  space,  unity  and 
repose,  Prescott  was  as  much  superior  to  Macaulay  as 
he  seems  to  be  inferior  when  you  look  only  at  the 
foreground. —  Thomas  Starr  King. 


EDWARD  NORTON. 

278.  Edward  Norton  was  the  exemplar  of  a  Judge 
of  a  subordinate  Court.  He  was  learned,  patient,  in 
dustrious,  and  conscientious;  but  he  was  not  adapted 
for  an  appellate  tribunal.  He  had  no  confidence  in  his 


DISTINGUISHED    MEN.  347 

own  unaided  judgment.  He  wanted  some  one  upon 
whom  to  lean.  Oftentimes  he  would  show  me  the 
decision  of  a  tribunal  of  no  reputation,  with  apparent 
delight,  if  it  corresponded  with  his  own  views,  or  with 
a  shrug  of  painful  doubt  if  it  conflicted  with  them. 
He  would  look  at  me  in  amazement  if  I  told  him  that 
the  decision  was  not  worth  a  fig ;  and  would  appear 
utterly  bewildered  at  my  waywardness  when,  as  was 
sometimes  the  case,  I  refused  to  look  at  it  after  hearing 
by  what  Court  it  was  pronounced. — Judge  Stephen  J. 
Field. 


WILLIAM  C  RALSTON. 

276.  A  moneyed  king  has  fallen  from  his  throne 
of  gold  prostrate  in  the  dust.  A  more  dreadful  fall 
has  ushered  him  into  the  portals  of  the  everlasting 
world.  The  loss  is  a  general  one,  a  great  indescribable 
calamity  to  the  State.  Had  I  the  power  I  would  hang 
California  in  the  blackest  crape,  from  Siskiyou  to  San 
Diego,  for  he  has  left  us  who  made  California  a  syno 
nym  for  princely  hospitality  and  generosity  to  the  utter 
most  bounds  of  the  morning.  Whatever  may  have 
been  his  defects,  his  many  virtues,  his  tragic  death, 
have  hidden  them  from  mortal  sight  and  criticism 
forever.  His  most  fitting,  touching  and  eloquent  eulo- 
gium  was  pronounced  in  the  question  asked  in  every 
street  of  San  Francisco,  "Who  shall  take  his  place?" 
His  heart  was  as  large  as  the  mountain;  he  was  noble, 
generous  and  true;  his  friendship  unswerving.  Honor, 

23 


348  CALIFORNIA    ANTHOLOGY. 

unfading  honor,   to  his    memory !     Peace,   everlasting 
peace,  to  his  soul. — Dr.  J.  Campbell  Shorb. 


277.  WHAT  PARTS  of  human  speech  can  eulogize 
him?  What  brush  of  artist,  what  pen  of  dramatist, 
what  voice  of  speaker  can  depict  the  benefaction  of  his 
generous  life  and  the  tragedy  of  his  death?  His  deeds 
may  be  heard  in  tones  that  sound  like  the  blare  of 
trumpets.  His  monuments  rise  from  every  rod  of 
ground  in  San  Francisco.  His  eulogy  is  written  on  ten 
thousand  hearts.  Commerce  commemorates  his  deeds 
with  her  whitening  sails  and  her  laden  wharves.  Phil 
anthropy  sings  the  chimes  of  all  public  charities,  in 
attestation  of  his  munificence.  Patriotism  sings  paens 
for  him  who,  in  the  hour  of  the  nation's  struggle,  sent 
the  ringing  gold  of  mercy  to  chime  with  the  flashing 
steel  of  valor.  Unnumbered  deeds  of  private  gene 
rosity  attest  his  secret  munificence.  Sorrow  has  found 
solace  in  his  deeds.  Despair  has  been  lifted  into  hope 
by  his  voice.  There  are  churches  whose  heaven-kiss 
ing  spires  chronicle  his  donations;  schools  claim  him  as 
their  patron;  hospitals  own  him  as  their  benefactor. 
He  was  the  supporter  of  art;  science  leaned  on  him 
while  her  vision  swept  infinity.  The  footsteps  of  pro 
gress  have  been  sandaled  with  his  silver.  He  has  up 
held  invention  while  she  wrestled  with  the  forces  of 
nature.  He  was  the  life-blood  of  enterprise;  he  was 
the  vigor  of  all  progress;  he  was  the  epitome  and  rep 
resentative  of  all  that  was  broadening  and  expansive, 
and  uplifting  in  the  life  of  California. —  Thomas  Fitch. 


DISTINGUISHED    MEN.  349 

OSCAR  L.   SHAFTER. 

278.  To  walk  in  justice,  mercy  and  humility  be 
fore  God,  saves  the  soul.  Judge  Shafter  believed  this. 
To  say  that  some  special  belief  or  mystical  experience 
must  be  added,  he  held  as  the  cant  of  a  technical  faith. 
He  was  a  devoted  worshiper  of  God.  As  his  writings 
abundantly  showed,  he  was  what  the  church  would  call 
a  man  of  prayer.  At  every  piece  of  good  news  or 
instance  of  unusual  prosperity  there  is  an  expression  of 
heartfelt  thankfulness  to  the  Divine  source  of  blessing. 
When  sad  tidings  came  or  calamity  befel,  he  turned  to 
his  closet,  his  bible  and  his  God,  for  thought  and  com 
fort.  And  no  puritan  with  his  catechism  was  more 
diligent  in  the  family  than  he,  in  inculcating  the  great 
truths  of  religion,  reverence  towards  God,  and  love 
to  man.  This  never  ceased  until  disease  broke  his 
strength.  The  world  may  have  given  him  little  credit 
for  his  religion.  He  did  not  wear  it  on  the  outside,  for 
show.  It  was  in  the  heart,  in  the  honest  doing  of  the 
work  given  him  to  do,  and  in  quiet  deeds  of  goodness 
to  men.  The  church  sometimes  called  him  an  infidel. 
His  piety  did  not  run  in  the  channel  of  her  ceremonies 
or  bear  the  stamp  of  her  dogmas.  Will  God  reject 
pure  love  for  that  reason  ?  The  churches  must  make 
room  for  such  a  man,  or  that  grand  day  of  broader  light 
that  hastens  on  will  have  no  room  for  her.  Educate 
a  people  till  they  love  the  truth  as  well  and  can  see  as 
broadly  as  Judge  Shafter  did,  and  they  will  not  go  into 
our  churches  as  they  are.  Germany  is  saying  this  to  us 
to-day;  Oxford  is  saying  it;  Cambridge  is  saying  it; 


350  CALIFORNIA    ANTHOLOGY. 

Yale  is  saying  it.  Every  center  of  learning  and  supe 
rior  intelligence  in  Christendom  is  saying  it.  The 
guild  of  scientific  men  all  over  the  world  are  saying  it, 
with  an  approach  to  unanimity  that  ought  to  be  alarm 
ing  to  one  who  really  loves  the  church,  and  sees  its  im 
portance.  It  is  a  question  of  life  and  death  with  the 
church.  Her  teachers  may  shut  themselves  up  in  their 
little  circle  of  thoughts,  and  deny  that  there  is  any 
broader  flow  from  the  Fountain  of  Eternal  Truth,  but 
the  mightier  minds  of  the  world  that  sweep  through 
their  lines  and  out  into  the  ocean  that  rolls  all  around 
them,  will  never,  never  strike  back  towards  the  center 
of  darkness  and  ignorance  for  the  sake  of  sailing  in 
their  company. — Rev.  L.  Hamilton. 


SHAKESPEARE. 

279.  More  than  two  centuries  have  elapsed  since 
Shakespeare's  Works  were  first  published,  and  still  the 
ages,  rolling  onward,  add  greener  leaves  to  the  eternal 
amaranth  of  his  fame.  The  circle  of  his  influence, 
widening  and  expanding,  has  extended  to  lands  undis 
covered  in  his  day,  and  embraces  all  the  empires  of 
the  civilized  earth.  Within  the  cloistered  walls  of 
Westminster  Abbey,  arises  a  pale  forest  of  monumental 
marble  above  the  ashes  of  England's  illustrious  dead. 
Even  in  that  grand  mausoleum,  no  monument  erected 
to  sovereign,  hero,  philosopher  or  statesman,  appeals  to 
the  heart  and  imagination  of  the  world  like  the  tomb 
which,  on  the  banks  of  the  beautiful  Avon,  bears  the 
immortal  name  of  Shakespeare. — Frank  Tilford^ 


DISTINGUISHED    MEN.  351 

PERCY  BYSSHE  SHELLEY. 

28O.  In  Shelley's  works  we  have  a  sufficient  basis 
for  fruitful  study  both  of  the  man  and  of  his  place  in 
literary  history.  Especially  is  this  basis  for  study  an 
important  one,  if  we  wish  to  consider  Shelley  with 
reference  to  the  great  political  and  intellectual  move 
ment  of  his  age  and  ours,  the  movement  to  which  may 
be  applied  the  one  name,  the  Revolution.  As  is  true 
in  case  of  every  individual  man,  and  especially  in  case 
of  any  great  man,  so  of  Shelley  it  is  true,  that  wonder 
ful  as  the  personal  qualities  of  the  poet  are,  they  do 
not  so  much  deserve  study  as  do  the  works  and  words 
whereby  the  man  influences  his  Age,  embodies  its 
thought,  and  plays  a  part  in  its  conflicts. 

Human  consciousness,  both  theoretical  and  practical, 
has  in  it,  two  elements,  one  of  ceaseless  change,  the 
other  of  permanence.  In  so  far  as  all  conscious  thoughts 
and  deeds  are  in  time,  each  moment  is  in  some  measure 
independent  of  all  others,  and  so  human  ideas,  and  acts, 
and  purposes,  are  in  reality  recreated,  made  afresh,  from 
moment  to  moment.  Ceaseless  activity,  in  some  sense 
creative  activity,  is  the  universal  rule  of  conscious  life. 
Hence  simple,  passive,  submission  to  tradition  is  in 
itself  not  possible.  Even  the  oldest  tradition  must  be 
over  and  over  again  restated,  and  so  in  a  measure  re 
formed,  reconstructed  from  moment  to  moment,  and  so 
subject  to  alteration,  yet  this  tendency  to  alteration,  re 
sulting  from  the  fact  that  doctrines  and  customs  do  not 
live  on  from  age  to  age  as  continuous  existences,  but 
have  to  be  reborn  for  every  generation,  this  law  of 
change  is  modified  by  the  other  law,  the  law  whereby 


352  CALIFORNIA    ANTHOLOGY. 

in  each  new  effort  to  formulate  doctrine  or  to  readjust 
custom,  appeal  is  made  to  the  past,  and  conscious  effort 
to  imitate  the  past  is  always  to  be  found.  The  rebirth 
of  old  traditions  from  moment  to  moment,  from  age  to 
age,  in  human  consciousness,  is  not  a  rebirth  or  remak 
ing  at  random,  but  a  deliberate  attempt  to  produce  some 
thing  that  is  like  the  past.  And  this  second  tendency, 
the  tendency  towards  permanence,  only  gives  place  to 
the  former  tendency  altogether  when  new  experiences, 
new  problems,  in  short  a  new  environment,  make  im 
possible  or  intolerable  a  conscious  imitation  of  past 
traditions.  Then  we  have  the  phenomenon  called 
revolution.  The  extent  and  character  of  the  revolu 
tion  depends  in  any  case  on  the  nature  of  the  new 
experiences,  on  the  character  of  the  old  traditions,  and 
on  the  activity  of  the  minds  concerned.  Very  common 
in  revolution  is  the  effort  to  appeal  from  a  tradition  of 
an  age  immediately  past  to  the  tradition  of  a  long  past 
time,  or  from  a  complex  tradition  to  a  simple  one.  In 
other  words,  the  tendency  towards  change  is  never 
pure  and  unmixed,  but  we  always  find  a  union,  or,  better, 
a  conflict,  between  the  tendency  to  permanence  and  the 
tendency  to  new  constructions.  Absolutely  conserva 
tive  and  absolutely  revolutionary  movements  do  not  ex 
ist.  The  conservative  is  a  revolutionary  spirit  who 
has  succeeded  in  his  revolution  and  has  brought  his 
traditions  into  harmony  with  his  experience.  The 
lover  of  revolution  is  simply  the  seeker  after  a  tradi 
tion  in  which  he  may  rest;  he  is  desirous  of  nothing  so 
much  as  a  good  opportunity  to  become  conservative. 

-Josiah  Royce. 


DISTINGUISHED    MEN.  353 

SOCRATES. 

281.  A  short  time  since,  a  lawyer  in  the  Court  of 
Athens  moved  that  the  sentence  of  Socrates  be  reversed 
on  the  record.      It  has  already  been   reversed.      The 
Judges  took  the  poison  in  their  verdict.     To  him  the 
hemlock  was  a  pledge  of  earthly  immortality.      Not  a 
particle  of  his  bodily  frame  is  lost.      Is  that  robust  soul 
quenched  ?     Is  the  Almighty  so  penurious  of   matter 
and  so  careless  of  mind,  that  he  saves  every  ounce  of 
man's  poor  body,  yet  permits  a  gill  of  poison  utterly  to 
extinguish  his  spirit  ? — Thomas  Starr  King. 

282.  HE  WAS  a  mystic,  a  fellow  with  Quakers  and 
Swedenborgians,   a  seer,   a   saint.      He   believed  truth 
intuitively — he  did  not  investigate  it.      He  believed  he 
had  a  call  to  his  work,  that  he  was  empowered  by  the 
Deity  to  perform  his  calling.      He  had  faith  in  oracles 
and  dreams,  in  supernatural  influences  and  divinations. 
He  experienced  divine  warnings,  had  spirit-rappings  in 
his  bosom.      He  carried  a  flaming  heart  hidden  under 
his  philosophic   ice.      He   would   hold  a  thought  and 
inspect  it  as  a  mineralogist  holds  a  mineral.     He  would 
strip  off  layer  after  layer  of  logic  as  -one  peels  off  the 
plates  of  mica  from  a  specimen.      He  was  a  Jeremy 
Bentham  and  a  George  Fox  welded  into  one. —  Thomas 
Starr  King. 

GEN.  JOHN  A.  SUTTER. 

283.  He  was  the  architect  whose  hand  laid  the  foun 
dation  of  this  commonwealth;  the  patriarch  whose  voice 


354  CALIFORNIA    ANTHOLOGY. 

encouraged  those  who  built  its  stately  fabric.  It  rarely 
happens  that  an  individual  gives  form  and  character 
unto  an  epoch;  yet  the  life  of  John  Augustus  Sutler, 
and  the  events  of  his  career,  exemplify  the  civilization 
of  nearly  half  a  century;  that  civilization  which  began 
with  the  colonial  enterprise  of  a  resolute  explorer  and 
expanded  into  the  formation  of  a  mighty  State.  As 
Napoleon  was  the  King  of  the  Kings  of  Europe,  so  this 
man  was  the  Pioneer  of  the  Pioneers  of  California.  In 
him  were  manifested  all  the  hardihood,  the  energy,  and 
the  courage  which  distinguished  those  illustrious  pioneers 
of  an  earlier  day,  whose  achievements  have  become 
historic.  Insensible  to  peril  or  privation,  he  and  his 
scanty  band  of  followers  forsook  the  busy  haunts  of 
men  to  penetrate  into  the  remotest  regions  of  the  West, 
where  nature  still  held  solitary  sway.  He  brought  the 
light  of  culture  and  refinement  into  a  wilderness  whose 
only  tenants  were  the  wild  beast  and  the  savage.  As 
a  bulwark  against  their  attacks,  whether  insidious 
or  open,  he  constructed  a  rude  fort  upon  the  very  spot 
where  afterward,  before  his  eyes  had  closed  in  death,  a 
populous  city  reared  its  solid  structures,  and  massed  its 
teeming  life.  Impelled  by  a  spirit  of  enterprise,  un 
tiring  and  resistless,  he  extended  his  operations  over  a 
wide  expanse  of  territory,  until  accident  revealed  the 
startling  fact  that  the  soil  he  cultivated  concealed  a 
harvest  in  its  bosom,  not  such  alone  as  responded  to 
the  customary  course  of  tillage,  but  a  harvest  literally 
golden.  In  the  land  he  had  chosen  for  his  heritage 
he  had  realized  the  Ophir  of  tradition. — Joseph  W. 
Winans. 


DISTINGUISHED    MEN.  355 

284.  IN  THE  histories  of  past  ages  and  nations, 
there  are  names  that  will  live  in  enduring  remembrance 
while  freedom  exists  on  earth.  The  virtues  and  patri 
otism  of  Epaminondas  perpetuate  his  name  as  the 
brightest  that  adorns  the  history  of  Theban  Independ 
ence.  The  courage  of  Hannibal,  whose  conquering 
legions  traversed  the  Alps,  and  overswept  the  classic 
plains  of  Italy,  is  indelibly  associated  with  the  unfor- 
gotten  glory  of  Carthage.  With  Athens  is  identified 
a  galaxy  of  her  brilliant  sons,  and  clusters  of  constel 
lated  names  adorn  the  coronal  of  Roman  fame.  But 
in  the  cycle  of  coming  years,  when  the  pen  of  the 
historian  shall  trace  the  origin  and  settlement  of  this 
occidental  commonwealth,  shall  depict  the  virtues,  the 
sufferings,  privations,  fortitude  and  intrepidity  at  the 
basis  of  the  achievement,  shall  describe  the  mighty 
impulse  it  has  given  to  the  progress  of  free  government 
and  extension  of  free  principles,  and  shall  glisten  the 
truthful  page  with  the  names  of  the  heroic  founders  of 
its  fame,  there  is  none  that  will  gem  the  record  with  a 
purer  or  more  enduring  lustre  than  the  name  of  the 
immortal  SUTTER — the  illustrious  ORIGINAL  of  CALI 
FORNIA  PIONEERS. — Col.  E.  J.  C.  Kewen. 


WASHINGTON. 

285.  Washington  was  the  chief  builder  of  our 
temple  of  freedom.  •  His  principles  were  liberty  and 
the  constitution.  He  fought  for  liberty,  not  for  itself 
alone,  but  that  we  might  have  a  Union  to  protect  us. 


356  CALIFORNIA   ANTHOLOGY. 

The  Union,  in  his  view,  was  not  only  a  blessing,  it  was 
the  store-house  of  all  the  blessings  which  a  free  govern 
ment  could  dispense  to  man,  and  by  means  of  which 
any  individual  man  could  rise  up  to  take  his  place 
among  the  princes  of  the  earth.  Men  of  the  North 
and  of  the  South,  Washington  was  your  countryman. 
No  sectional  feeling  animated  his  breast  when  he  drew 
his  sword  for  liberty  on  northern  soil,  or  when  followed 
by  northern  soldiers,  he  tracked  the  foe  through  the 
larid.  He  was  of  the  Union  and  fought  for  the  Union. 

—Edward  Stanly. 

286.  OF  ALL  men   who  ever  lived,    I  think  the 
judgment  of  his  cotemporaries  and  of  posterity  is,  as  it 
will  be  the  judgment  of  all   history,  that  he   never  in 
his    life   yielded    to  one    ignoble   or   merely  sectional 
thought.     He  yielded  the  whole  of  his  glorious  life,  the 
whole  of  his  great  heart,  the  whole  of  his  self-denying, 
wise  and  majestic  nature,  to  the   whole  people,  of  the 
whole  country,  in  all  the  States,  in  all  the  sections,  with 
out  distinction  of  creed,   or  race,  or  party,  or  locality, 
for  his  own  time,  and  for  all  time. — Eugene  Casserly. 

287.  THE  GENERALITY  of  men  do  not  properly  ap 
preciate  the  character  of  Washington.      Many  feel  that 
his  talents  were  not  above  mediocrity,  that  his  great 
ness  consisted  in  his  goodness,  his   freedom  from  am 
bition,  his   punctuality  and  method,   his  admirable  bal 
ance  of  faculties — that,   in   short,  destitute   of  all   bril 
liancy  and  genius,  his  qualities  were  akin   to  those  of 
an  "an  old  fogy."     This    mistaken   idea  has  perhaps 


DISTINGUISHED    MEN.  357 


been  brought  about  by  the  eulogies  of  mediocrity,  drag 
ging  him  down  its  own  level;  aided  perhaps  by  the 
general  dissemination  of  the  engraved  portrait  by 
Stuart,  in  which  the  noble  lines  of  the  mouth  are  dis 
torted  and  weakened  by  a  set  of  false  teeth.  It  is  ab 
surd  and  dangerous  to  paint  for  the  popular  eye  show- 
pictures  of  stalwart  soldiers,  or  on  the  other  hand,  por 
traits  of  old  men.  It  would  have  raised  the  patriotism 
of  the  country  thirty  per  cent,  to  have  had  as  its  ideal 
the  Washington  of  45,  as  Leutze  painted  him,  crossing 
the  Delaware,  to  make  his  eagles  swoop  on  Trenton. 
The  great  eminence  of  Washington  is  attributable  to 
the  tremendous  forces  of  spirit  that  in  his  character 
were  nicely  balanced  and  harmonized.  Stuart,  the 
painter,  said  that  every  feature  of  Washington  was  in 
dicative  of  the  strongest  passions,  and  yet  men  have 
come  to  regard  him  as  the  type  of  serene  benignity,  simply 
a  very  judicious  man.  In  1 799,  at  a  dinner  party,  Wash- 
inton  received  the  news  of  St.  Clair's  surprise  by  the 
Indians,  and  the  bloody  massacre  which  followed.  He 
put  the  dispatches  into  his  pocket  and  remained  tranquil 
until  the  last  guest  had  departed,  and  then  burst  forth 
in  a  torrent  of  indignation,  which  shook  him  like  an 
inward  tempest.  Then,  growing  calm,  he  said  in  a  low 
tone,  "Nothing  of  this;  Gen.  St.  Clair  shall  have  just 
ice.  I  will  receive  him  without  displeasure;  I  will  hear 
him  without  prejudice;  he  shall  have  full  justice."  It 
is  important  that  men  should  have  these  glimpses 
through  refts  into  the  depths  of  Washington's  being,  that 
he  shall  not  seem  a  huge,  moral  wax  statue.  It  is  just  as 
important  to  know  that  once,  in  a  boat  on  the  Hudson, 


358  CALIFORNIA   ANTHOLOGY. 

he  threw  himself  back  in  a  paroxysm  of  glee,  and  on 
another  occasion,  actually  rolled  on  the  grass  in  uncon 
trollable  laughter  at  a  comical  story.  He  once  danced 
three  hours  with  Mrs.  Gen.  Greene,  without  sitting 
down,  and  Gen.  Greene,  not  at  all  jealous,  spoke  of  it 
as  "a  pretty  little  frisk."  Washington's  nature  was 
like  that  of  a  planet,  with  massive  momentum,  and  his 
fits  of  passion  were  earthquakes,  showing  the  flame 
pent  within  the  planet's  granite  ribs. 

His  greatest  service  was  not  military,  but  civil — the 
work  of  organizing  the  Republic.  He  believed  that 
God  created  this  country  to  be  one.  The  Creator 
placed  no  Mason  and  Dixon's  line  upon  it;  that  was  the 
work  of  foolish  men.  He  marked  no  boundaries  for 
rival  civilizations  in  the  immense  basins  of  the  West. 
The  Mississippi,  like  a  great  national  tree,  has  its  root 
in  the  hot  gulf,  and  spreads  its  top  to  the  far,  icy  North 
— a  glorious  tree,  with  boughs  in  different  latitudes, 
and  branches  binding  the  Rocky  Mountains  and  the 
Lakes  together,  its  great  trunk  the  central  artery  of  a 
national  unity.  And  so  Providence  seems  to  have  set 
Washington  in  the  core  of  the  national  history,  as  he 
set  the  Mississippi  in  the  core  of  the  land,  to  be  a  per 
petual  force  upon  the  affections  of  the  nation  in  behalf 
of  union.  We  should  feel  prouder  to  be  of  the 
Nation  than  of  the  State.  Our  feet  may  stand  on  local 
soil,  but  we  should  cherish  the  idea  that  our  country  is 
bounded  on  the  East  by  the  Atlantic,  and  on  the  West 
by  the  Pacific. — Thos.  Starr  King. 


DISTINGUISHED    MEN.  359 

WASHINGTON  AND  GARIBALDI. 

288.  The  life  of  the  Washington  of  Italy,  unlike 
that  of  the  Washington  of  America,  was  not  always  on 
one  grade  of  dignity.  He  relieved  his  heroic  cam 
paigns  by  candle  making  on  Staten  Island,  and,  when 
at  the  very  flood  of  his  career,  was  "  Red  Shirt  the 
First."  In  writing  the  story  of  Washington,  the  only 
reliefs  to  the  monotonous  dignity  of  his  life,  of  which 
the  writer  may  legitimately  avail  himself,  are  the  rare 
glimpses  of  the  foremost  of  modern  men  on  his  farm 
and  among  the  children.  But  the  story  of  Garibaldi, 
told  correctly,  furnishes  glory  and  shadow,  in  all  desira 
ble  alternation,  action  and  repose,  lofty  military  bearing 
and  candle-dipping — a  charmingly  varied  display,  look 
ing  on  the  canvas  more  like  the  master's  composition 
than  a  copy  from  nature;  a  specimen  of  realism  lived 
out  after  the  programme  of  an  idealist. — Dr.  Franklin 
TuthilL 


rx. 


PART   IX. 


CALIFORN1ANA. 


289.  BECAUSE  COMMODORE  SLOAT  did  not  rush 
to  the  execution  of  the  orders  issued  in  anticipation  of 
war,  on  the  very  first  report  of  a  collision  between  the 
United  States  and  Mexico,  the  anxious  Secretary  of 
the  Navy,  dreading  to  lose  the  prize,  hotly  censured 
him  in  a  letter  which  reached  him  after  the  event  had 
broken  the  sting  of  its  reproaches,  and  served  only  to 
assure  him  how  well  he  had  fulfilled  the  wishes  of  his 
government.  The  flag  of  the  United  States  was  no 
sooner  flying,  than  the  Collingwood  entered  the  bay  of 
Monterey.  There  had  been  a  race  between  the  Col- 
lingwood  and  the  Savannah.  What  a  moment  was  that 
for  us,  and  for  the  world!  What  if  the  Collingwood  had 
been  the  swifter  sailer,  and  Sloat  had  found  the  English 
flag  flying  on  the  shore!  What  if  we  had  been  born 
on  another  planet!  The  cast  was  for  England  or  the 
United  States,  and  when  the  die  turned  for  us,  the  in 
terest  was  at  an  end. — Edmund  Randolph. 


-"362  CALIFORNIA    ANTHOLOGY. 

29O.  CALIFORNIA  in  full  possession  of  the  white  man 
and  embraced  within  the  mighty  area  of  his  civilization! 
We  feel  the  sympathies  of  our  race  attract  us.  We  see 
in  our  great  movement  hitherward  in  1849  a  likeness 
to  the  times  when  our  ancestors,  their  wives  and  little 
ones,  and  all  their  stuff  in  wagons,  and  with  attendant 
herds,  poured  forth  by  nations  and  in  never-ending  col 
umns  from  the  German  forests,  and  went  to  seek  new 
pastures  and  to  found  new  kingdoms  in  the  ruined 
provinces  of  the  Roman  Empire;  or,  when  swayed  by 
another  inspiration,  they  cast  their  masses  upon  the 
Saracens,  and  sought  to  rescue  the  Sepulchre  of  Christ 
from  the  infidels.  We  recognize  that  we  are  but  the 
foremost  rank  of  the  multitude  which  for  centuries  has 
held  its  unwavering  course  out  of  Europe  upon  America, 
in  numbers  still  increasing;  a  vast,  unnumbered  host, 
self-marshaled,  leaderless,  and  innumerable,  moving  on 
ward  forever,  to  possess  and  people  another  continent; 
separated  but  in  space,  divided  but  by  the  accidents  of 
manners,  of  language  and  of  laws — from  Scandinavia 
to  California — one  blood  and  one  people.  Man  of  our 
race  has  crowned  the  earth  with  its  glory  I  Knowledge 
is  but  the  conservation  of  his  thoughts,  art  but  the  em 
bodiment  of  his  conceptions,  letters  the  record  of  his 
deeds.  And  still  in  the  series  of  his  works  we  have 
founded  a  State.  May  it  be  great  and  powerful  whilst 
the  ocean  shall  thunder  against  these  shores.  WTe  have 
planted  a  people;  may  they  be  prosperous  and  happy 
whilst  summers  shall  return  to  bless  these  fields  with 
plenty.  And  may  the  name  of  the  PIONEER  be  spoken 
in  California  forever! — Edmund  Randolph. 


CALIFORNIANA.  363 

291.  It  is  wonderful  how  little  of  vulgar  avarice, 
or  even  of  the  just  and  prudent  intention  to   improve 
their  fortunes,  had  to  do  with  the  earlier  immigrants  to 
California.     Theirs  was  the  antiquated  Homeric  spirit. 
It  was  their  pride  and  boast — and  the  memory  of  their 
contemporaries  and  the  enduring  result  proves  the  fact 
— that  they  were  able  to   win  the  greatest  of  all  tri 
umphs,   the  victory  over  themselves;     that  they  were 
able  to  preserve  order  without  law ;  that  they  were  able 
to  maintain  justice  without  tribunals;  that  their  posses 
sion  of  absolute  personal  independence  never  degenera 
ted  into  selfishness,   nor  the  almost  savage  liberty  of  a 
country  without  law,  into  cruelty  or  oppression.     Shall 
we,  who,   in    conscious   fulfilment  of  a  great  mission, 
brought  method  out  of  chaos,  and  cultivated  the  flowers 
of  justice  and  safety   in  the  soil  of  anarchy — yield  to 
lesser  dangers  and  baser  temptations  ?     Shall   we  soil 
the  splendor  of  the  past? — Edward  C.  Marshall. 

A  GIRLISH  CLEOPATRA. 

292.  And  what  shall  be  California's  effigy?     As 
suredly  woman;  that  soft,  round,   poetic  bundle  of  vo 
luptuous  sensibility,  that  bankrupted  nature  in  the  mak 
ing.     But  what  class  and  quality  of  that  sweet  gender? 
Not  as  a  sovereign  do  we  see  her,  howsoever  enthroned 
between  the  Sierra   and  the  sea,  or  howsoever  some 
time  she  shall  queen  it  over  West  and  East;  not  yet  as 
-fine  lady,   or  peasant,    or   prudish    spinster,    or   staid 
matron,  even  though  she  be  mother  of  men.      Not  as 
Hippolyte,  the  war-god's  daughter,  shall  we  personate 
her,  or  other  Amazonian  breast-cutter;  she  is  too  virgin 


364  CALIFORNIA    ANTHOLOGY. 

and  amiable  for  fighting.  Not  as  Sheba,  to  probe 
with  hard  questions  any  Solomon;  wit  and  wisdom  are 
not  to  be  despised,  but  the  think  of  gold  is  more  satis 
fying  than  any  words,  though  accompanied  by  the  mu 
sic  of  the  spheres.  Not  as  Pandora,  for  though  all- 
gifted,  she  never  was  created  to  bring  misery  upon  men. 
If  for  California's  fit  representation  we  must  have  a 
goddess,  perhaps  Athene,  who  now  graces  her  seal,  is. 
as  proper  a  personage  as  any.  Springing  all  armored 
into  being,  appearing  at  once  as  the  protectress  of  men. 
and  of  women,  of  arts  and  agriculture  and  government, 
with  wisdom  and  power  harmoniously  blended,  and 
more  ethical  in  her  character  than  any  of  the  deities, 
she  presents  more  perfectly  the  ideal  of  a  healthful, 
vigorous  minded,  and  progressive  people. 

Too  perfectly,  in  fact.  Minerva  is  a  noble  creation; 
but  for  California's  incarnation  I  should  choose  flesh 
more  wanton,  more  sensuous,  less  intellectual,  less  se 
verely  chaste,  more  artless.  Indeed,  I  should  not  trouble 
the  Olympian  divinities  at  all  for  my  prototype,  but  take 
from  some  lesser  hill  a  creature  nearer  me  in  warm, 
palpitating  humanity;  not  so  lofty  as  to  be  lost  in  un 
reality,  nor  yet  so  prosaic  that  her  simple  presence 
should  not  act  upon  me  like  a  medicine.  She  should 
be  large,  and  supple-limbed;  low  browed,  with  a  flood 
of  golden  hair  veiling  her  exquisitely  moulded  form; 
deep  blue  eyes,  whose  dreamy  languor  a  merry  reck 
lessness  sadly  should  disturb;  nose  and  chin  Grecian; 
ripe,  luxurious  lips,  parted  by  a  breath  of  almost  visible 
fragrance;  while  expression,  voice,  and  attitude  should  all 
betoken  an  indolent,  romantic  nature,  overflowing  with 


CALIFORNIANA.  365 

high,  exultant  spirits.  A  thousand  years  hence,  the 
patron  goddess  of  Athens  may  be  California's  appro 
priate  model;  but  to-day  she  is  a  girlish  Cleopatra, 
rather  than  a  full-fledged  Minerva. — Hubert  H.  Ban 
croft. 

293. — SUNRISE  FROM  THE  SIERRAS. 
The  gentle  lustre  of  the  morning  star; 
The  sweet  submission  in  its  fading  rays; 
The  rising  radiance  of  the  golden  bar, 
The  eastern  sky  in  grayish  fields  displays: 
The  leaping  up,  from  some  great  sea  of  fire, 
Of  mighty  lances  of  resistless  light, — 
Betokening  the  Day-King's  fierce  desire 
With  martial  pomp  to  slay  the  hosts  of  night. 

— Charles  A.  Sumner. 

294.  OUR  DUTY  AND  DESTINY. — Each  age  in 
the  history  of  the  world  has  received  its  enlighten 
ment  from  some  central  point.  Light  first  shone 
in  the  fabled  regions  of  the  East,  and  the  birth-place 
of  the  race  was  the  starting  point  of  its  intellectual 
illumination;  thence  through  the  mysterious  schools 
and  priestcrafts  of  Egypt;  through  the  delicate 
philosophies  of  Greece;  through  the  Pantheism,  unbe 
lief  and  brutal  force  of  ancient  Rome;  through  the 
martyrdoms,  councils  and  hierarchies  of  modern  Rome; 
through  Germany,  France  and  England — this  light  at 
last  has  reached  to  us.  It  has  crossed  four  continents; 
it  has  traveled  six  thousand  years,  and  returns  now  to 
greet  us  at  the  very  portals  of  its  starting  point.  This 
light  is  the  light  of  civilization,  of  progress,  of  religion, 


366  CALIFORNIA   ANTHOLOGY. 

of  the  arts  and  sciences,  of  all  useful  improvements,  of 
all  ameliorations  in  the  conditions  of  men;  it  is  the 
light  of  knowledge,  humanity,  love  and  power;  it  is  the 
sum  of  all  experiences;  the  epitome  of  all  histories; 
the  grand  result  of  all  that  the  human  race  has  ever 
said,  or  thought,  or  done.  We  look  across  a  narrow 
sea  and  behold  in  the  forms  of  government,  modeled 
upon  the  patriarchal,  and  assuming  naturally  the  des 
potic,  in  the  doctrines  of  the  Brahmins  and  the  moral 
teachings  of  Confucius,  that  state  of  society,  morals 
and  religion,  almost  without  a  change,  which  existed 
in  the  first  ages,  and  which  has  been  constantly  modi 
fied,  enlarged  and  illuminated  in  its  western  progress, 
until  it  has  reached  us  such  as  we  find  it  to-day. 
The  sun  does  not  go  backwards.  We  stand  at  the 
outer  verge  of  this  course,  midway  between  the  East 
and  the  West — the  interpreter  between  the  old  and  the 
new,  the  living  and  the  dead. 

From  us,  and  not  back  again  over  the  weary  course 
which  it  has  traversed  for  six  thousand  years — from  us 
must  come  the  inspiration  and  the  light  which  shall  re 
vivify  and  re-glorify  the  worn-out  nations  of  "the  land 
of  the  East,  and  the  clime  of  the  sun." 

For  this  great  destiny,  I  fondly  hope  that  we  are  a 
peculiar  and  a  chosen  people.  I  hope  still  more  fondly 
that  California  will  be  fitted  and  prepared  to  stamp  upon 
the  age  impress  of  an  influence  no  less  happy  than 
grand — the  impress  of  a  free  and  imperial  race. 

-JudgcT.  W.  Freclon. 


CALIFORNIANA.  367 

296.  We  cannot,  if  we  would,  separate  our  pride 
in  our  own  State  from  our  love  of  all  the  States.  When, 
in  mental  contemplation,  we  behold  our  beloved  Cali 
fornia  in  the  Pantheon  of  the  Nations,  her  majestic 
form  reclined  upon  her  mountain  couch  of  gold,  and 
the  rippling  tide  of  a  mighty  ocean  toying  with  her 
marble  feet,  we  see  her  surrounded  by  the  grand  figures 
of  her  sisters — composing  a  group  the  admiration  and 
delight  of  the  peoples.  Already  we  boast  that  we 
are  citizens,  not  of  a  single  State,  but  of  a  wondrous 
Empire,  extending  from  the  blue  lakes,  which  part  us 
from  the  British  Dominion,  to  the  great  Gulf  of  the 
South ;  from  the  Atlantic-beaten  cliffs  of  farthest  Maine 
to  where  the  surges  of  the  Pacific  lave  the  cleft  moun 
tains  of  our  own  beautiful  Golden  Gate.  Soon  may 
generous  legislation  and  fraternal  love  produce  their 
natural  result — unending  harmony  within  our  borders. 
May  all  hearts,  throughout  the  vast  expanse  of  our 
territory,  respond  in  sympathetic  unison  to  the  electric 
thrill  of  every  living  thought,  every  noble  impulse,  so 
that — old  disputes  ended,  old  quarrels  healed — there 
shall  be  no  rivalry  between  the  citizens  of  our  dear 
country,  save  the  rivalry  of  self-denial,  magnanimity 
and  patriotism.  Long  years  hence,  when  our  children 
shall  celebrate  the  returning  anniversary  of  this  day, 
the  last  of  the  Pioneers,  with  bent  form  and  whitened 
locks,  shall  take  the  place  of  honor  amongst  them. 
And  as  he  shall  hear  a  speaker,  more  worthy  of  the 
theme  and  the  occasion,  rehearse  the  eventful  story  of 
his  contemporaries,  it  will  be'  the  old  man's  proudest 
reminiscence  that  he,  too,  performed  his  part  in  ex- 


368  CALIFORNIA    ANTHOLOGY. 

tending  the  foundations  of  that  great  Temple  of  Lib 
erty,  whose  base  shall  be  a  continent;  beneath  whose 
protecting  shadow  shall  dwell,  in  peace  and  prosperity, 
a  hundred  millions  of  freemen ;  and  the  glory  of  whose 
summit  shall  illumine  a  world. 

-Judge  E.   W.  McKinstry. 

296. — EL  Rio  SACRAMENTO.— 

Where  ice-clad  summits  greet  the  morn, 
And  where  the  beetling  crags  look  down 
On  dark  blue  lakes  with  sullen  frown, 
This  bantling  of  the  clouds  is  born; 
Forth  from  its  granite  cradle  creeps, 
At  first  in  play  it  laughs  and  leaps, 
And  then  in  dusky  pools  it  sleeps. 
Down  silent,  sunless  glens  it  glides, 
And  under  long  sedge  grasses  hides, 
Where  aspen  leaves,  like  quivering  wings, 
Quaver  above  its  hidden  springs. 

Anon,  in  silver-sheeted  falls, 

It  leaps  the  terraced  mountain  walls, 

And  tumbles  into  rocky  urns, 

Beflecked  with  foam  and  fringed  with  ferns. 

At  last  this  half-grown  infant,  fed 
By  melting  snow  and  falling  rain, 
Like  bruin  chafing  with  his  chain, 
Growls  hoarsely  in  its  granite  bed, 
And  plows  its  pathway  to  the  plain. 
Meanwhile,  by  some  designing  will, 


CALIFORNIANA.  369 

Harnessed  and  schooled,  it  turns  the  mill, 
And  with  its  ponderous  sledge  unlocks 
The  concrete  coffers  of  the  rocks. 

In  middle  summer,  lank  and  lean, 

It  creeps,  the  shelving  rocks  between, 

And  then  in  spring  and  autumn  tide, 

Crimson  with  carnage,  flushed  with  pride, 

In  serried  ranks  of  gleaming  pikes, 

It  dashes  on  the  yielding  dikes, 

And  breaks  the  ramparts,  rushing  down 

Upon  defenceless  farm  and  town. 

In  tamer  moods,  content  to  hold 
By  croft  and  thorp,  by  field  and  fold, 
Past  orchard  boughs  and  bending  grain, 
Past  grazing  herds  and  loaded  train, 
Past  children  laughing  at  their  play, 
The  tedious  tenor  of  its  way. 

In  ceaseless,  silent  sweep,  between 
Low  lying  meadows,  rank  and  green, 
Along  the  marge  of  bastioned  banks, 
Its  dimpled  face  reflects  the  ranks 
Of  gray  beard  oaks;  its  liquid  kiss 
Thrills  all  the  river  reeds  with  bliss. 
The  thirsty  fibrils  of  the  vine 
Reach  down  to  quaff  its  amber  wine; 
The  grasses  and  the  willows  lave 
Their  tangled  tresses  in  its  wave. 
The  silver  cord  has  grown  to  be 
A  mother  avalanche  set  free — 


370  CALIFORNIA   ANTHOLOGY. 

Its  paths  the  highway  of  the  world, 
Where  sails  of  commerce  are  unfurled, 
Emblem  of  Time's  resistless  tide. 
On,  and  still  on,  its  currents  glide, 
Until,  at  length,  far,  far  below, 
It  weds  the  sea  with  stately  flow. 

—Gen.  L.  H.  Foote. 

297.  SAN  FRANCISCO. — Our  modern  civilization  is 
a  three-fold  product.  From  Rome  we  get  our  concrete 
logic,  and  the  theory  and  practice  of  our  legislation. 
From  Athens  our  modes  of  thought,  and  the  taste  for 
the  beautiful  and  the  true.  From  Judea  our  morals, 
and  that  idea  of  the  equality  of  men  in  the  sight  of  God, 
which  has  resulted  in  that  political  equality  which  we 
call  democracy. 

Rome  had  her  Capitol.  There  were  her  archives; 
her  Sibylline  oracles,  her  treasury,  her  mint;  the  spoils 
she  had  taken  in  war;  the  Sabine  wolf,  the  symbol  of 
her  origin;  the  temples  of  the  Capitoline  Jove,  of  Juno, 
and  of  Minerva. 

Athens  had  her  Acropolis.  There  were  deposited 
her  laws;  her  revenues;  the  busts  of  her  founders;  the 
portraits  of  her  heroes;  the  images  of  her  gods;  the 
wonderful  statue  of  her  protectress,  Minerva. 

Jerusalem  had  her  double  hill,  where  were  her  temple; 
the  altar  of  the  unseen  God,  the  Holy  of  Holies;  the 
City  of  the  King;  the  treasury;  the  citadel;  and  the 
Courts  of  Justice. 

It  may  therefore  be  regarded  as  an  instinct  of  civili 
zation  that  every  enlightened  people  should  select  some 


CALIFORNIANA.  371 

favored  spot,  and  stamp  it  as  the  centre  of  its  power, 
by  the  erection  of  monuments  which  symbolize  at  once 
its  advancement,  its  institutions,  its  culture,  its  taste, 
and  its  hopes  for  the  future.  And  such  an  event  is  a 
great  one. 

In  such  a  presence  I  cannot  turn  back  to  the  past 
and  recount  what  we  and  our  comrades  have  done. 
[Address  at  laying  of  the  corner-stone  of  the  New  City 
Hall,  San  Francisco,  February  22d,  1872— EDITOR.] 
I  seem  rather  to  be  rapt  into  the  presence  of  the  great 
future.  I  am  not  unmindful  of  that  great  immigration, 
unprecedented  in  all  history,  which  set  down  at  once 
three  hundred  thousand  men,  with  all  the  training, 
wants  and  aspirations  of  the  highest  civilization,  in  the 
desert  wastes  of  California;  we  found  ourselves  a  mere 
military  colony,  outside  of  the  guaranties  of  the  Fed 
eral  Constitution,  and  our  very  laws  written  in  a  foreign 
tongue.  We  were  in  the  midst  of  chaos,  but  we  knew 
that  the  whirling  forces  were  the  elements  of  empire. 
We  felt  the  spirit  moving  on  the  face  of  the  waters, 
and  were  sure  that  the  dry  land  of  the  continent  would 
soon  appear. 

On  this  occasion  we  cast  behind  us  all  that  we  have 
achieved,  all  that  we  have  suffered,  during  the  past 
twenty-five  years.  The  fires  and  floods,  the  paralysis 
of  panic,  the  intestine  struggles,  in  which  the  higher 
law  of  self-preservation  was  indicated  by  the  tempo 
rary  suspension  of  the  law  of  routine — these  are  suffer 
ings  which  live  only  in  memory,  and  no  longer  in  feel 
ing,  and  whose  recollections  produce  even  a  sad  pleas 
ure.  Not  so  the  thought  that  so  many  of  our  com- 


372  CALIFORNIA    ANTHOLOGY. 

rades  have  perished  by  the  way.  The  very  soil  upon 
which  we  stand  [the  old  cemetery,  reclaimed  from  the 
dead  and  made  the  site  of  the  beautiful  New  City 
Hall — EDITOR.]  is  sown  with  the  bones  of  some  of  the 
noblest  Pioneers  that  ever  cast  their  lives  in  the  balance 
to  win  the  destiny  of  Empire; 'while  we,  not  braver  nor 
more  worthy,  stand  in  the  presence  of  that  future 
in  which  they,  too,  believed,  and  to  which  we,  bending 
over  their  graves,  now  give  a  new  date,  and  of  which 
we  thus  make  ourselves  a  part.  So  looked  the  great 
leader  of  Israel  from  his  mountain  hight  upon  the 
Promised  Land.  So  looked  Columbus,  with  earnest, 
straining  gaze,  upon  the  Ne>v  World  which  he  gave  to 
civilization.  So  looked  out  Cortez  and  Pizarro  upon 
the  great  Southern  Sea. 

But  we  have  accomplished  more  than  these  men 
did.  We  are  in  possession  of  the  Promised  Land.  We 
have  found  the  way  to  India,  which  Columbus  thought 
he  had  discovered,  but  which  he  never  reached.  We 
have  made  conquests  in  the  Pacific  Ocean  of  which 
Cortez  and  Pizarro  never  dreamed.  Commerce  is  the 
queen  of  nations.  Hers  is  the  Universal  Empire.  It 
knows  neither  geographical  nor  political  limits.  To 
her,  both  civilization  and  barbarism  bring  their  tributes. 
Throned  upon  the  land,  she  wields  her  scepter  over  the 
most  distant  sea. 

In  1850,  we  looked  at  the  future  of  San  Francisco 
with  the  same  assured  hope  which  we  cherish  to-day. 
And  yet  at  that  time  we  believed  that  the  placers 
would  be  exhausted,  as  they  have  been;  we  had  no  hint 
of  the  precious  veins  in  the  rocky  ribs  of  the  Sierras; 


CALIFORNIANA.  373 

nor  did  we  hope  that  ours  could  ever  be  an  agricultural 
State;  but  we  looked  at  our  glorious  bay,  mighty 
enough  to  receive  the  fleets  of  all  nations;  at  the  vast 
Pacific  Coast,  as  yet  virgin  to  systematic  commerce; 
and  at  the  great  islands  and  continent  of  the  Southern 
Sea,  and  boldly  wrested  from  the  oracles  of  destiny,  a 
prediction  of  the  future  greatness  of  our  city. 

Not  unto  us  be  the  glory;  "The  Lord  hath  built  the 
house;  the  Lord  hath  kept  the  city."  He  hath  given 
commerce  as  her  sustenance  and  her  strength.  She  is 
not  great  and  powerful,  nor  will  she  be  enduring  in  her 
strength  because  she  is  the  metropolis  of  California, 
but  because  she  is  the  metropolis  of  the  whole  Pacific 
Coast  and  of  the  Great  Southern  Sea.  And  because  she 
is  so  great  in  this  element  of  strength,  she  is,  in  this, 
greater  than  the  State  itself.  She  is  more  necessary  to 
the  State  than  the  State  is  to  her.  She  is  the  great 
entrepot  of  the  Pacific  Ocean,  the  great  point  of  recep 
tion  and  distribution,  and  such  she  would  still  be,  though 
she  were  built  like  Venice,  on  a  few  sandy  islands;  or 
like  Petra,  in  a  desert;  or  like  Tyre,  upon  a  rock. 

Oh,  People  of  California,  cherish  San  Francisco! 
She  is  not  merely  one  of  your  jewels,  but  she  is  the 
very  crown  of  your  glory,  all  gold  and  jewels.  You 
cannot  control  her  destiny,  although  you  may  impede 
her  march.  You  may  make  of  the  State  a  cattle  past 
ure,  and  give  it  a  mock  legislature  which  shall  repre 
sent  beasts  and  not  men;  you  may  tax  her  commerce 
and  retard  her  development;  but  you  cannot  defeat 
her  destiny.  Or  you  may  cherish  her  as  your  first  and 
noblest  born ;  you  may  people  her  outlying  valleys  with 


374  CALIFORNIA    ANTHOLOGY. 

a  happy  and  cultivated  population,  and  plant  with  dwel 
lings,  school-houses  and  churches,  the  wastes  which 
now  resound  only  with  the  tread  of  cattle  and  the  bel 
lowing  of  brutes;  you  may  give  her  a  free  port;  and, 
above  all,  you  may  let  her  alone,  with  her  limbs  un 
swathed  and  strength  unaided,  to  work  out  her  high 
destiny.  So  shall  she  be  for  untold  ages,  the  Queen 
City  of  the  vast  Southern  Sea.  Into  her  lap  Commerce 
shall  pour  the  treasures  of  the  Pacific,  while  her  heart  re 
sponds  to  the  electric  pulsations  of  the  great  continents 
and  empires  washed  by  the  boundless  oceans  of  the 
West.  Here  to-day  we  have  marked  and  consecrated 
the  centre  of  her  legislation ;  of  her  executive 
and  financial  administration;  of  her  educational  institu 
tions;  and  of  her  administration  of  justice. 

'The  day  is  auspicious.  It  is  the  anniversary  of  the 
birth  of  Washington,  the  only  one  who  has  given  to 
history  the  patriot's  name,  without  tarnish  and  without 
reproach;  the  serene  sky  spreads  above  us,  mild  and 
beneficent,  the  symbol  of  hope  and  peace;  the  eternal 
hills,  in  their  varied  beauty,  seem  to  promise  endurance 
to  our  work;  the  ever-moving  sea  presents  an  em 
blem  of  the  unrest,  the  ceaseless  activity,  and  the 
ultimate  success  of  our  commercial  empire. 

-John   W.  Dwindle. 


THE  MODOC  STRONG-HOLD. 

298.     The  Lava  Beds  are  of  historical  interest.  As 
the  scenes  of  Modoc  triumphs  they  will  ever  claim  the 


CALIFORNIANA.  375 

attention  of  the  civilized  world.     Seventy  warriors,  en 
cumbered  with  women  and  children  to  the  nnmber  ot 
two  hundred,   had  defied   the  United   States  Govern 
ment   for    months    and    months,    killed  and    wounded 
soldiers  equal  to  three  times  the  number  of  their  own 
fighting  force,  and  again  and  again  repulsed  attacking 
parties  consisting  of  several  hundred  regular  soldiers. 
I  recall  to  mind  no  instance  in  ancient  or  modern  war 
fare  surpassing  in  rude  heroism  the  desperate  defense 
made  by  the   Modocs.     Their  success,  of  course,  was 
largely  due  to  the  fact  that  the  soldiers  were  not  famil 
iar  with  the  ramifications  and  sinuosities  of  the  beds. 
The  Modoc  Lava   Beds  (there  are  other  lava  beds  in 
Oregon,    Idaho   and   Arizona)    are   situated    northeast 
from  Yreka,  Siskiyou   County,   California,  about  fifty- 
three  miles  in  an  air  line.     The  distance  is  over  eighty 
miles  by  road.     The  beds  proper  have  a  width   of  ten 
miles  north  and  south,  and  run  east  and  west  fifteen 
miles.    They  are  bounded  on  the  north  by  Rhett  Lake, 
half  of  which  sheet  of  water  is  in  Oregon.     The  old 
emigrant  road,  familiar  to  many  who  crossed  the  plains 
in  early  days,  skirts  the  eastern  side  of  the  beds.     To 
the   south  is  a  nameless   range    of  mountains.      The 
western  boundary  is  a  bluff  which  continues  north  along 
the  western  shore  of  the  lake.      It  is  a  rocky  bluff,  its 
face  nearly  a  sheer  precipice,  and  from  the  level  of  the 
beds  to  its   summit  the  distance    is  five   hundred  and 
eighty-six  feet.     The  bluff  is  the.  coigne  of  vantage  in 
viewing  the  beds.     The  entire  lava  country   is  com 
passed  in  a  sweeping  glance.      Looking  over   the  beds 
with  the  naked  eyes,  they  appear  to  consist  of  an  undu- 


376  CALIFORNIA    ANTHOLOGY. 

lating  plain.  The  sight  is  uninviting  because  of  the 
general  suggestion  of  desolation.  A  forsaken  region 
is  the  impression  left  upon  the  mind.  No  trees  are 
seen  in  the  immediate  foreground,  and  those  in  the  dis 
tance  are  dwarfed  into  bushes.  The  counterpart  of  this 
apparent  plain  may  be  seen  along  the  ocean  shore  of 
New  England.  Let  grounded  sea-weed  represent  the 
dark  lines  twisting  through  the  bed,  and  the  picture  is 
complete.  The  gentle  undulations,  as  they  appear  from 
a  distance,  the  waving  grass  and  bushes,  the  lights  and 
shadows  cast  on  the  surface  by  passing  clouds,  are  in 
strict  keeping  with  a  beach  landscape.  The  white, 
pumice-strewn  shore  of  Tule  Lake  makes  the  resem 
blance  most  complete.  I  know  the  beds  of  old.  To 
me  the  dark  lines  are  something  more  formidable  than 
soa-weed.  Every  one  of  them  recalls  to  memory 
adventures  more  or  less  disagreeable.  Away  in  the 
east,  distant  three  miles  as  the  crow  flies,  is  a  long,  dark, 
ragged  line — Jack's  famous  strong-hold. 

It  is  assumed  that  the  beds  were  once  occupied  by 
an  active  volcano.  Through  a  freak  of  nature  the 
volcano  sunk  into  the  earth  during  an  eruption,  and 
left  upon  the  surface  a  sea  of  seething  lava.  The  lava 
fused  the  rock  with  which  it  came  in  contact,  and,  as  a 
rule,  caused  a  complete  metamorphosis.  The  primary 
rocks  were  stratified  in  new  and  curious  forms.  The 
formations  exposed  are  of  trachyte  and  basalt.  Every 
ledge,  so  far  as  I  observed,  was  mineralized  with  iron. 
Rock  from  the  ledges  is  heavy  and  very  tenacious. 
The  rim  of  the  beds  is  from  fifty  to  one  hundred  yards 
in  width,  and  consists  of  chunks  of  lava  and  lava  dust. 


CALIFORNIANA.  377 

The  lava  in  the  rim  is  of  a  light  brown  color,  occasion 
ally  bordering  on  white,  and  weighs  little  more  than 
pumice  stone.  The  tough  lava  of  which  the  beds  are 
mainly  composed  is  black,  or  has  a  bluish  shade,  accord 
ing  to  locality.  The  loose  pieces  of  lava  on  the  out 
skirts  of  the  beds  indicate  that  the  coating,  as  before 
suggested,  was  once  in  a  liquid  state.  The  fragments 
are  porous  and  curved.  Each  had  its  place  in  the  huge 
bubbles  of  the  lava  sea.  There  are  immense  numbers 
of  funnel-like  outlets,  in  which  steam  has  been  gene 
rated  below  and  gas  exploded,  the  openings  being  small 
at  the  bottom  and  large  at  the  top,  with  crevices  around. 
Where  the  steam  has  not  exploded  strongly  enough  to 
blow  the  rocks  entirely  clear,  and  has  left  these  funnels, 
it  has  upheaved  the  rocks  and  allowed  them  to  fall  back 
loosely,  so  as  to  form  immense  heaps. 

The  true  character  of  the  Lava  Beds  cannot  be 
learned  by  inspection  from  afar.  Nothing  but  close 
acquaintance  will  inform  the  visitor.  Pass  inside  of  the 
rim  and  you  fail  to  find  a  level  spot.  Every  rock  stands 
on  end,  and  exposes  angular  points.  When  the  war 
began,  the  Indians  were  scattered  along  the  western 
border.  After  several  battles  they  suddenly  vanished 
as  by  magic.  It  was  supposed  that  they  had  fled  to  a 
distant  locality.  A  reconnoissance  developed  them  in 
what  was  aptly  termed  the  back-bone  of  the  beds,  or 
Captain  Jack's  strong-hold.  This  bone  consists  of  a 
nob  of  giant  ledges  in  the  northeastern  portion  of  the 
lava  section.  These  ledges  crop  out  boldly  and  have 
no  special  course.  The  best  defined  ledge  generally 
trends  north  and  south.  The  lesser  ledges  run  nearly 


378  CALIFORNIA    ANTHOLOGY. 

parallel  at  times,  and  again  cut  in  at  right  angles.  The 
mean  level  of  the  beds  is  below  that  of  the  lake.  As 
you  draw  near  the  stronghold  it  becomes  necessary  to 
descend  into  irregular  chasms.  Before  you  have  time 
to  study  the  topography  of  the  place,  ledges  loom  up 
fifty  and  sixty  feet  high,  directly  in  front,  and  all  but 
compel  a  halt.  The  savages,  pressed  by  the  troops, 
retired  from  ledge  to  ledge,  and  each  retreat  carried 
them  to  higher  ground  and  gave  them  additional  ad 
vantages.  The  strong-hold  proper  is  about  the  sum 
mit  of  several  of  the  boldest  ledges.  They  radiate 
from  a  common  center  and  are  difficult  of  access.  Along 
the  top  of  each  ledge  is  a  natural  channel  three  or  four 
feet  in  depth,  wherein  the  cunning  savage  can  skulk 
and  shoot  and  still  remain  unseen.  The  channels  are 
complicated  and  labyrinthian.  Modocs  had  dwelt 
here  for  ages,  so  said  tradition,  and  yet  the  followers  of 
Jack  would  not  trust  to  memory  as  they  moved  about. 
They  failed  to  feel  securely  familiar  with  this  pile  of 
rocks  two  hundred  yards  square,  and  had  the  different 
channels  marked  by  bits  of  wood!  The  rocks  are  not 
adapted  to  cave  formations.  The  caves  mentioned  in 
war  telegrams  are  spacious  basins  occurring  in  the  solid 
rock.  Those  in  the  strong-hold  are  one  hundred  or 
more  feet  in  circumference,  and  have  a  depth  of  fifty 
feet.  Overhanging  rocks  furnish  a  few  of  these  caves 
with  what  might  be  termed  incomplete  roofing.  Jack's 
band  made  a  stand  in  the  strong-hold,  and  played  sad 
havoc  with  assailing  parties.  One  night  the  water  in 
the  strong-hold  gave  out.  The  only  convenient  source 
of  supply  was  the  lake,  distant  one  mile.  Between  the 


CALIFORNIANA.  379 

strong-hold  and  the  lake  was  a  line  of  soldiers.  Before 
morning  the  Modocs  fled  from  this  rocky  fastness  to 
the  southern  end  of  the  beds,  where  Hasbrouck  finally 
gave  them  so  much  trouble. 

Five  miles  south  of  Rhett  Lake,  and  in  the  south 
eastern  portion  of  the  lava  deposit,  are  two  bold  buttes, 
united  by  a  narrow  tongue  of  black  lava,  which  are  of 
pure  scoria.  Each  of  these  buttes  has  a  crater  at  its 
crest.  Close  at  hand  are  a  number  of  lava  buttes,  with 
craters.  All  of  these  buttes  combined  could  not  have 
made  the  overflow  constituting  the  beds,  albeit  the  lips 
of  the  craters  have  been  cut  by  streams  of  lava  which 
cooled  in  the  shadowy  past.  The  marvelous  power  of 
nature,  as  exemplified  in  the  configuration  of  the  rocks 
about  these  buttes,  and  the  lines  of  demarkation  be 
tween  fusion  complete  and  arrested,  make  a  lasting  im 
pression  upon  the  most  superficial  beholder.  There  is 
an  appalling  sublimity  in  the  sight  which  one  cannot 
shake  off.  The  surface  of  the  earth  is  in  ruins  here. 
Tree,  plant  and  grass  are  absent.  The  lava  is  sombre 
black.  There  are  bottomless  fissures  from  one  to  two 
feet  in  width  and  miles  in  length.  There  are  broad 
chasms  over  one  hundred  feet  deep.  There  are  per 
fect  arches — keystone  and  all — suggesting  remnants  of 
a  Reman  temple.  There  are  odd  forms  and  profiled 
which  would  do  credit  to  a  gifted  sculptor.  The  ledges 
often  lie  parallel,  like  so  many  dark,  forbidding  waves, 
each  ledge  dotted  with  circular,  sharp-edged  hollows. 
The  striking  characteristics  of  this  wonderful  home  of 
the  Modocs  were  outlined  in  my  mind  as  I  stood  on 
the  bluff  that  night.  But  darkness  wrapped  the  beds 


380  CALIFORNIA    ANTHOLOGY. 

in  a  pall,  and  I  retired  to  a  welcome  couch  on  Mother 
Earth. —  Wm.  M.  Bunker. 

299.  OUR  DUTY  AND  DESTINY. — The  poet's  Gol 
den  Age  is  lost  from  sight  in  the  mists  of  fable,  and 
hid  by  centuries  of  war  and  crime;  but  the  age  of 
Ages,  the  Song  of  Songs,  lies  before  us,  brought  nearer 
by  each  changeful  year.  The  world,  which  began  with 
a  Garden  of  Eden,  shall  complete  the  cycle,  and  come 
once  more  to  be  a  garden  as  fair  as  that  lost  angel-guard 
ed  beauty.  Nations,  it  may  be,  shall  yet  unite  their  wealth 
and  energy  to  reclaim  the  historic  deserts  of  Asia,  to 
replant  the  treeless  wastes,  to  revive  the  dead  rivers 
and  rebuild  the  fallen  cities  of  the  East.  Here  in  Cali 
fornia,  we  too  have  deserts  to  plant  with  palms,  and 
naked  mountains  to  clothe  with  Cyprus  and  pine.  There 
are  swamps  and  malarial  regions  to  be  reclaimed  with 
Eucalyptus,  and  red  lands  to  be  covered  with  orchards 
and  vineyards.  There  is  room  for  many  more  homes 
and  industries.  Our  most  fertile  valleys  must  sustain  a 
much  greater  population,  and  in  the  course  of  time 
become  beautiful  beyond  expression.  Wheat  culture 
will  in  a  measure  pass  to  newer  States  and  virgin  soil, 
and  the  sceptre  of  grain  will  leave  our  hands.  Our 
large  ranches  will  be  divided  and  subdivided,  and  we 
shall  enter  upon  a  period  of  unclouded  prosperity, 
founded  on  diversified  interests  and  the  highest  de 
velopment  of  horticulture  in  all  its  branches. 

To  this  future,  then,  we  look.  Southern  Europe  is 
in  many  respects  our  type  and  example.  Whatever 
Greece,  Italy  and  Spain  were  in  their  noblest  days,  that 


CALIFORNIANA.  381 

we,  also,  hope  to  become,  except  that  as  our  facilities 
are  greater,  so  our  mingling  of  the  beauties  of  a  world 
may  be  greater.  A  cosmopolitan  people,  not  narrow 
or  prejudiced,  strong,  earnest,  truthful,  original;  state- 
builders,  home-lovers,  believers  in  education,  full  of 
nature's  naturalness — this  is  that  end  to  which  we  of  a 
ruder,  more  fertile  age  must  toil,  setting  our  faces 
toward  the  morning.  Our  State  is  not  a  tent  of  the 
Saxon  race,  pitched  hastily  by  this  western  ocean,  but  a 
temple  rising  in  the  sight  of  all  men.  It  is  not  yet 
finished;  the  pioneers  of  '49  hewed  monolithic  stones, 
fit  for  a  new  Temple  of  the  Sun.  Here  the  great  shall 
worship  when,  ages  hence,  the  story  we  are  now  begin 
ning  shall  be  continued  in  the  deeds  of  our  children; 
when  our  ancestral  oaks,  now  just  planted,  shall  become 
hoary  monarchs  tottering  to  their  fall;  when  the  new 
walls  of  our  young  University  shall  be  as  gray  and 
venerable  as  classic  Oxford.  Let  us  patiently  do  the 
work  of  to-day,  so  that  our  rude  beginnings  shall  not 
be  useless,  but  linked  with  past  and  future.  These 
rivers  and  lakes,  the  beautiful  bay  of  San  Francisco, 
the  lonely  cliffs,  the  pallid  snow-peaks,  shall  all  be  parts 
of  a  classic  clime.  It  is  man's  labor  and  heroic  deeds 
which  put  a  new  and  more  divine  seal  to  Nature's 
fairest  scenes.  Mount  Shasta,  in  its  translucent  majesty 
shall  out-rival  Mont  Blanc;  our  Sierras  shall  awaken 
nobler  poems  than  Alps  or  Appenines.  So  shall  these 
western  shores  become  lands  of  cultured  groves  and 
gardens,  and  horticultural  triumphs,  linked  closely  with 
Art,  Literature,  and  the  multiplied  pursuits  of  a  refined 
and  powerful  race. — Charles  H.  Shinn. 


382  CALIFORNIA    ANTHOLOGY. 

3OO.  CALIFORNIA  HUMORISTS. — California,  during 
this  quarter-century,  has  produced  more  humorists,  and 
more  of  that  literature  which  is  essentially  humorous, 
than  all  the  rest  of  the  country.  It  may  be  difficult  to 
trace  to  any  outward  sources  the  inspiration  of  so  much 
wit.  Does  it  lie  in  the  odd  contrasts  and  strange  situa 
tions  which  so  often  confront  the  observer  here?  Nor 
has  this  facetiousness  depended  at  all  for  its  develop 
ment  upon  any  degree  of  prosperity.  In  fact,  the 
boldest  and  bravest  challenge  which  has  ever  been 
given  to  adverse  fortune  here,  has  been  by  the  gentle 
humorists  who  have  suffered  from  her  slings  and  arrows. 
It  is  said,  "  Cervantes  smiled  Spain's  chivalry  away." 
But  these  modern  satirists  made  faces  at  bad  fortune; 
they  lampooned  her  and  defied  her  to  do  her  utmost. 
The  more  miserable  they  ought  to  have  been,  the 
happier  they  were.  They  found  a  grotesque  and  comic 
side  to  the  most  sober  facts.  They  were  facetious 
when  there  was  small  stock  in  the  larder  and  smaller 
credit  at  the  bankers.  They  smiled  at  the  very  grimness 
of  evil  fortune  until  she  fled,  and,  in  doing  this,  they 
half-unconsciously  tickled  the  midriff  of  the  world.  A 
ripple  of  laughter  ran  over  the  surface  of  society.  It 
sometimes  made  slow  progress  when  it  here  and  there 
met  a  mountain  of  obtuseness.  But  wit  is  wit;  and 
what  difference  does  it  make  if,  failing  to  see  the  point, 
some  people  laugh  next  year  instead  of  this  ?  I  will 
not  be  distressed  because  my  friend  does  not,  to  this 
day,  see  how  the  immortal  "Squibob"  conquered  his 
adversary  at  San  Diego  by  falling  underneath  him  and 
inserting  his  nose  between  his  teeth.  Nor  does  it 


CALIFORNIANA.  383 

greatly  concern  me  that  he  does    not   assent   to  the 
proposition  that  John  Phoenix,  having  made  a  national 
reputation  by  editing  the  San   Diego  Herald  for  one 
week,  was  the  greatest  journalist  of  modern  times.     If 
reputation  is  the  measure  of  greatness,    Phoenix   is  to 
this  day  without  a  peer.      He  made   the   very  desert 
sparkle  with  his  wit.     He  was  a  humorous  comet,  shoot 
ing  across  the  horizon  of  pioneer  life.      Men  looked  up 
and  wondered  whence  it  came  and  whither  it  had  gone. 
Possibly,   there  is  something  favorable  to  the  play  of 
humor  in  a  greater  freedom  from  conventional  limita 
tions.       If   one   grows    into   this   larger   liberty,    or  is 
translated  into  it,  a  flavor  of  freshness  comes  to  per 
vade  all  his  intellectual  life.     A  certain  spontaneity  of 
expression,   a  spring,   a  rioting  song  of  gladness,  are 
some  of  the   signs   of  this   more  abounding  life.      In 
homely   phrase,   we  say   there  is   a  flavor  of  the  soil 
about  it.     It  might,  therefore,  have  been  necessary,  that 
Mark   Twain   should    sleep    on  this   soil,    and   should 
have  a   wide   range  of  pioneer  experience,   before  he 
could  become  the  prince  of  grotesque  humorists.      He 
got  up  suddenly  from  the  very  soil  which  in   its  secret 
laboratory  colors  the  olive  and  the  orange,   and  began 
to  make  the  world  laugh.     With  a  keen  sense  of  the 
symmetry   and  harmony  of  things,  he   had  a  keener 
perception  of  all  the  shams  and  ridiculous  aspects  of 
life.      His  pungent  gospel  of  humor  is  as  sanitary  as  a 
gentle  trade  wind.      He  knew  a  better  secret  than  the 
old  alchemists.      Every  time  he  made  the  world  laugh, 
he  put  a   thousand  ducats  into  his  pocket.      But  never 
until  he  had  slept  in  his  blankets,  had  been  robbed  on 


384  CALIFORNIA    ANTHOLOGY. 

the  "  Divide,"  and  had  learned  the  delicate  cookery  of 
a  miner's  cabin,  could  he  do  these  things.  But  now  he 
cannot  even  weep  at  the  tomb  of  his  ancestor,  Adam, 
without  moving  the  risibles  of  half  the  world.  He  has 
also  a  finer  touch  and  flavor,  not  of  the  rankest  soil, 
but  of  that  which  gives  the  aroma  and  delicate  bouquet 
to  the  rarest  mountain-side  vintage.  When  this  man 
had  tried  his  wit  on  a  California  audience,  and  had  won 
an  approving  nod,  he  had  an  endorsement  that  was 
good  in  any  part  of  the  English-speaking  world. 

Of  a  more  subtile  wit  and  a  finer  grain  was 
Harte,  who  did  his  best  work  as  a  humorist  in 
California.  All  his  earlier  triumphs  were  won  here. 
His  subsequent  endorsement  in  a  wider  field  was 
only  an  affirmation  of  this  earlier  public  judgment. 
Sometimes  in  the  thicket,  one  may  come  up.on  a  wild 
mocking-bird  which  is  running  up  the  gamut  of  its 
riotous  burlesque  upon  the  song  of  every  other  bird, 
and  the  sound  of  every  living  thing  in  the  forest.  But 
when  all  this  is  done,  that  mocking-bird  will  sometimes 
give  out  a  song  which  none  other  can  match  with  its 
melody.  As  much  as  this,  and  more,  lay  within  the 
range  of  this  poet-satirist.  His  mocking  had,  however, 
a  deep  and  salient  meaning  in  it.  When  Truthful 
James  rises  to  explain  in  what  respect  Ah  Sin  is  peculiar, 
he  has  a  higher  purpose  than  merely  to  show  the  over 
reaching  cunning  of  this  bronzed  heathen,  "  with  the 
smile  that  was  child-like  and  bland.1'  When  the  sup 
posed  pliocene  skull,  found  in  Calaveras  County,  had 
developed  a  good  deal  of  scientific  quackery,  Harte,  in 
his  "Geological  Address,"  makes  the  skull  declare  that 


CALIFORNIANA.  385 

it  belonged  to  Joe  Bowers,  of  Missouri,  who  had  fallen 
down  a  shaft.  For  six  months  thereafter  no  theorist 
was  able  to  discuss  the  character  of  that  fossil  with  a 
sober  countenance.  No  Damascus  blade  ever  cut  with 
a  keener  stroke  than  did  the  blade  of  this  satirist,  even 
when  it  was  hidden  in  a  madrigal  or  concealed  in  some 
polished  sentence  of  prose. 

As  a  humorist,  he  appreciated  humor  in  others. 
When  Dickens  died,  not  another  man  in  all  the  length 
and  breadth  of  the  land  contributed  so  tender  and 
beautiful  a  tribute  to  his  memory  as  did  Harte  in  his 
poem  of  "  Dickens  in  Camp."  It  was  left  to  this  shy 
man,  who  came  forth  from  the  very  wastes  of  this  far- 
off  wilderness,  to  lay  upon  the  bier  of  the  dead  humorist 
as  fragrant  an  offering  as  any  mortal  fellowship  could 
suggest.  It  was  a  song  in  a  different  key — as  if  one 
having  entered  into  the  very  life  of  the  great  novelist, 
had  also  for  a  moment  entered  into  his  death. 

Another  humorist,  radically  the  product  of  California, 
was  Prentice  Mulford.  When  it  was  found  that  he 
had  a  genuine  vein  of  wit  in  him,  recognized  alike  in 
the  brilliant  salon  and  the  miner's  camp,  he  was  sent 
forth  as  another  missionary  to  reclaim  the  world. 

The  wit  and  the  poetry  which  ripen  here  are  under 
the  same  sun  which  ripens  the  pomegranate  and  the 
citron.  The  grain  and  texture  have  always  been  better 
than  that  suggested  by  the  coarser  materialism  without. 
It  is  little  to  him  who  is  cutting  his  marble  to  the  di- 
vinest  form,  that  the  whole  city  reeks  with  grime  and 
smoke,  and  all  its  outlines  are  ugly  and  misshapen.  It 


38 o  CALIFORNIA  ANTHOLOGY. 

is  little  to  poet  or  painter  that  sometimes  the  earth  has 
only  a  single  tint  of  gray,  since  he  may  also  see  in  con 
trast  what  a  transfigured  glory  there  may  be  on  moun 
tain  and  on  sea. 

There  are  not  at  any  time,  in  this  dull  world,  so  many 
genuine  humorists  as  one  may  count  on  his  fingers. 
For  lack  of  some  healthy  laughter  the  world  is  going 
to  the  bad.  It  welcomes  the  gentle  missionary  of  hu 
mor,  and  for  lack  of  him  it  often  accepts  those  dreary 
counterfeits  who  commit  assault  and  battery  on  our 
mother  tongue.  As  in  olden  times  the  prophets  were 
sometimes  stoned  in  their  own  country,  so  in  modern 
times  one  cannot  tell  whether  the  poet-prophet,  who 
comes  up  from  the  wilderness,  will  fare  better  or  worse. 
Woe  to  him  if  the  people  cannot  interpret  him,  or  are 
piqued  at  his  coming. 

None  of  us  would  be  comfortable  with  only  some 
pungent  sauce  for  dinner;  but  when  a  dreadful  stale- 
ness  overtakes  the  world,  it  is  ready  to  cry  out,  "More 
sauce!"  Whoever  comes,  therefore,  bringing  with  him 
salt  and  seasoning,  and  whatever  else  gives  a  keener 
zest  to  life,  never  comes  amiss.  Sooner  or  later  we 
shall  know  him.  He  will  come  very  near  to  us  in  his 
books,  and  by  that  subtle  law  of  communion  which, 
through  the  brightest  and  noblest  utterances,  makes  all 
the  better  world  akin. 

After  we  have  seen  the  tricks  of  the  magician,  we 
do  not  care  to  know  him  any  more;  but  the  magician 
of  wit  works  by  an  enchantment  that  we  can  never 
despise.  His  spell  is  wrought  with  such  gifts  as  are 


CALIFORNIANA.  387 

only  given  from  the  very  heavens  to,  here  and  there, 
one.  It  is  not  the  mythical  Puck  who  is  to  put  a  girdle 
round  the  world,  but  the  man  of  genius,  whose  thought 
is  luminous  with  the  light  of  all  ages.  So  Shakespeare 
clasps  the  world,  and  Dickens  belts  it,  and  the  men  of 
wit  and  genius  furnish  each  a  golden  thread  which  girds 
it  about.  The  book  of  humor  is  the  heart's  ease.  In 
every  library  it  is  dog-eared,  because  it  has  in  it  some 
surcease  for  the  secret  ills  of  life.  If  a  million  souls 
have  been  made  happier  for  an  hour  through  the  fic 
tions  of  Sir  Walter  Scott,  what  is  the  sum  of  good 
thus  wrought!  What  lesser  good  have  they  wrought 
who  have  come  in  later  times  to  lighten  the  dead 
weight  of  our  over- weighted  lives? — W.  C.  Bartlett. 


AUTHORSHIP  IN  CALIFORNIA. 

3O1.  The  exacting  conditions  of  pioneer  life  are 
not  favorable  to  authorship.  If,  during  this  quarter  of 
a  century,  not  a  book  had  been  written  in  California,  we 
might  plead,  in  mitigation,  the  overshadowing  material 
ism  which,  while  coarsely  wrestling  for  the  gains  of  a 
day,  finds  no  place  for  that  repose  which  favors  culture 
and  is  fruitful  of  books.  But  over  the  arid  plains,  in 
the  heat  and  dust  of  the  long  summer,  one  may  trace 
the  belt  of  green  which  the  mountain-stream  carries 
sheer  down  to  the  sea.  So  there  have  been  many 
thoughtful  men  and  women  who  have  freshened  and 
somewhat  redeemed  these  intellectual  wastes.  They 


888  CALIFORNIA   ANTHOLOGY. 

have  written  more  books  in  this  quarter  of  a  century 
than  have  been  written  in  all  the  other  States  west  of 
the  Mississippi  River.  The  publication  of  some 
of  these  books  has  cost  nearly  their  weight  in  gold. 
During  the  period  of  twenty-five  years,  more  than 
ninety  volumes  have  been  written  by  persons  living  at 
the  time  in  this  State. 

No  one  has  sought  to  live  here  exclusively  by  author 
ship.  It  has  only  been  the  incidental  occupation  of 
those  persons  who  have  written  out  of  the  fullness  of 
their  own  lives.  If  they  heard  no  mysterious  voice 
saying  unto  them:  "Write!" — the  great  mountains 
encamped  about  like  sleeping  dromedaries,  the  valleys 
filled  with  the  aroma  of  a  royal  fruitage,  the  serene 
sky,  and  the  rhythm  of  the  great  sea — all  make  audible 
signs  to  write.  They  have  written  out  of  a  fresh,  new 
life. 

It  is  this  large  acquaintance  with  Nature — this  lying 
down  with  the  mountains  until  one  is  taken  into  their 
confidence — that  may  give  a  new  vitality  and  enlarge 
the  horizon  of  intellectual  life.  Whence  comes  this 
man  with  his  new  poetry,  which  confounds  the  critics  ? 
And  that  man  with  his  subtle  wit,  borrowed  from  no 
school  ?  I  pray  you  note  that  for  many  a  day  his  car 
pet  hath  been  the  spicula  of  pine,  and  his  atmosphere 
hath  been  perfumed  by  the  fir  tree.  He  has  seen  the 
mountain  clad  in  beatific  raiment  of  white,  and  their 
"sacristy  set  round  with  stars."  He  will  never  go  so 
far  that  he  will  not  come  back  to  sing  and  talk  of  these 
his  earliest  and  divinest  loves.  So  Harte  comes  back 


CALIFORNIANA. 


389 


again  to  his  miner's  camp  and  to  the  larger  liberty  of 
the  mountains.  And  there  fell  on  Starr  King  a  grander 
inspiration  after  he  had  seen  the  white  banners  of  the 
snow-storm  floating  from  the  battlements  of  Yosemite. 

—  W.   C.  Bartlett. 


MISCELLANY, 


PART   X. 


MISCELLANY. 


THE  ATLANTIC  CABLE  (A.  D.  1858). 

3O2.  Thought  has  bridged  the  Atlantic,  and 
cleaves  its  unfettered  way  across  the  deep,  winged  by 
the  lightning  and  guarded  by  the  billow.  Though 
remote  from  the  shores  that  first  witnessed  the  deed, 
we  feel  the  impulse  and  swell  the  paean.  As  in  the 
frame  of  man  the  nervous  sensibility  is  greater  at  the 
extremity  of  the  body,  so  we,  distant  dwellers  on  the  Pa 
cific  feel  yet  more  keenly  than  the  communities  which 
form  the  centers  of  civilization,  the  greatness  of  the 
present  success  and  the  splendor  of  the  advancing 
future. 

From  the  dark,  unfathomed  caves  of  ocean  the  pearl 
that  heaves  upon  the  breast  of  beauty  is  dragged  to 
the  glare  of  day.  The  unburied  dead  lie  waiting  for 
the  resurrection  morning,  while  above  them  the  winds 
wail  their  perpetual  requiem;  there  the  lost  treasures 

27 


•392  CALIFORNIA   ANTHOLOGY. 

of  India  and  Peru  are  forever  buried;  there  the  wrecks 
of  the  Armada  and  Trafalgar  are  forever  whelmed. 
But  amid  these  scattered  relics  of  the  buried  past,  over 
shell-formed  shores  and  wave-worn  crags,  the  gleaming 
Thought  darts  its  way ;  amid  the  monsters  of  the  deep, 
amid  the  sporting  myriads  and  countless  armies  of  the 
sea,  the  single  link  that  unites  two  worlds,  conveys  the 
mandate  of  a  king  or  the  message"  of  a  lover.  Of  old, 
the  Greek  loved  to  believe  that  Neptune  ruled  the 
ocean  and  stretched  his  trident  over  the  remotest 
surge.  The  fiction  has  become  reality;  but  man  has 
become  the  monarch  of  the  wave,  and  his  trident  is  a 
single  wire!  All  creeds,  all  races,  all  languages  are 
here;  every  vocation  of  civilized  life  mingles  in  the 
shout  and  welcomes  the  deed.  The  minister  of  religion 
sees  the  Bow  of  Promise  reflected  under  the  sea,  which 
speaks  of  universal  peace;  the  statesman  perceives 
another  lengthening  avenue  for  the  march  of  free  prin 
ciples;  the  magistrate  can  see  here  new  guards  to  the 
rights  of  society  and  property,  and  a  wide  field  for  the 
spread  of  international  law;  the  poet  kindles  at  the 
dream  of  a  great  republic  of  letters  tending  toward  a 
universal  language;  and  the  seer  of  science  finds  a 
pledge  that  individual  enterprise  may  yet  embody  his 
discoveries  in  beneficent  and  world-wide  action. 

The  spectacle  which  marked  the  moment  when  the 
cable  was  first  dropped  in  the  deep  sea  was  one  of  ab 
sorbing  interest.  Two  stately  ships  of  different  and 
once  hostile  nations,  bore  the  precious  freight.  Meet 
ing  in  mid-ocean,  they  exchanged  the  courtesies  of  their 
gallant  profession — each  bore  the  flag  of  St.  George, 


MISCELLANY.  393 

each  carried  the  flaming  stripes  and  blazing  stars — on 
each  deck  that  martial  band  bowed  reverently  in  prayer 
to  the  Great  Ruler  of  the  tempest;  exact  in  order,  per 
fect  in  discipline,  they  waited  the  auspicious  moment  to 
seek  the  distant  shore.  Well  were  those  noble  vessels 
named — the  one,  Niagara,  with  a  force  resistless  as  our 
own  cataract,  the  other,  Agamemnon,  "King  of  Men," 
as  constant  in  purpose,  as  resolute  m  trial,  as  the  great 
leader  of  the  Trojan  war.  Right  well,  oh,  gallant  crew, 
have  you  fulfilled  your  trust!  Favoring  were  the  gales 
and  smooth  the  seas  that  bore  you  to  the  land!  And 
if  the  wishes  and  prayers  of  the  good  and  wise  of  all 
the  earth  may  avail,  yT>ur  high  and  peaceful  mission 
shall  remain  forever  perfect,  and  those  triumphant 
standards,  so  long  shadowing  the  earth  with  their  glory, 
shall  wave  in  united  folds  as  long  as  the  Homeric  story 
shall  be  remembered  among  men,  or  the  thunders  of 
Niagara  reverberate  above  its  arch  of  spray. 

— Gen.  E.  D.  Baker. 

303.  A  REFLECTION,  peculiarly  beautiful  and  ap 
propriate,  is  suggested  by  the  first  dispatch  transmitted 
from  Europe  to  America:  "Glory  to  God  in  the  high 
est,  and  on  earth  peace,  good  will  to  men."  This  salu 
tation  fell  from  angelic  lips,  addressed  to  the  simple 
shepherds  of  Judea,  as  they  watched  their  flocks  upon 
the  star-lit  plains  of  Bethlehem,  two  thousand  years 
ago.  It  breathed  the  spirit  of  thanksgiving,  of  peace 
and  kindness.  Since  that  period  the  world  has  under 
gone  strange  mutations.  The  star  of  empire  has  steadily 
held  its  course  westward;  commerce  has  changed  its 


394  CALIFORNIA    ANTHOLOGY. 

seat;  Palestine  lives  only  in  history;  and  Jerusalem, 
the  pride  of  the  East,  has  long  since  fallen  from  her 
high  estate.  The  torch  of  war  lit  up  her  temple  and 
her  streets,  and  her  gates  yielded  to  the  Saracen. 
Rome,  the  then  mistress  of  the  world,  at  whose  shrine 
the  learned  and  great  of  earth  paid  submissive  homage, 
is  now  but  a  spectral  shadow  of  her  former  self.  Her 
orators  are  silent,  her  generals  slain,  her  legions  scat 
tered,  her  sceptre  broken.  Britain  was  then  a  rude, 
barbarous  island,  scarcely  regarded  or  known.  Learn 
ing  and  religion  had  not  blessed  or  instructed  her,  nor 
the  light  of  science  dawned  upon  her.  To-day  she  is 
a  great  nation,  occupying  a  place  in  the  front  rank  of 
wealth  and  civilization,  powertul  on  the  land  and  supreme 
on  the  sea.  America  was  then  unknown  to  civilized 
men.  The  foot  of  the  Caucasian  had  never  pressed 
her  soil,  nor  had  her  peaceful  bosom  been  disturbed  by 
the  shock  of  barbarous  war  or  political  strife.  She  was 
just  as  God  had  made  her — silent,  beautiful,  grand. 
Nineteen  centuries  have  passed  away,  and  more  than 
fifty  generations  of  men  have  gone  down  to  their 
graves.  The  Church  has  endured  bitter  persecutions; 
Science  has  bled  beneath  the  heel  of  military  oppres 
sion;  the  lamps  of  learning  have  often  been  well-nigh 
extinguished;  splendid  libraries  have  been  consumed; 
and  yet  the  .heaven-born  salutation  song  to  the  Judean 
shepherds  is  still  preserved.  The  lightnings  of  heaven 
catch  the  strain,  and  through  the  deep,  resounding  sea, 
along  the  watery  thoroughfare  of  thought,  beyond  the 
explorations  of  curious  man,  amidst  coral,  rock,  and 
drifting  sands,  among  the  graves  of  lost  mariners,  shut 


MISCELLANY.  395 

out  from  the  light  of  day,  the  gaze  of  stars  and  the  din 
of  men,  these  words  of  peace  are  conveyed  to  expectant 
millions.  How  beautiful!  how  auspicious !  how  replete 
with  signs  and  promises  of  peace! — E.  D.  Wheeler. 


MATERIALISM. 

3O4.  Materialism  is  no  new  theory;  materialists 
have  disturbed  the  peace  in  the  harmony  of  truth  from 
time  almost  beyond  record ;  but  especially  does  the 
world  remember  the  name  of  Spinoza;  and  his  doctrine 
called  Spinozism  is  little  other  than  the  materialism  of 
to-day.  The  creative  power,  God,  the  Almighty,  was 
not  absolutely  denied  by  Spinoza;  but  as  in  his  doctrine 
of  chances  a  geometrical  forethought  antecedent  to  the 
formation  of  an  organism  was  impossible,  God  was  only 
an  early  form  of  matter. 

Spinoza,  born  in  1632,  in  Holland,  was  a  learned 
Jew;  but,  for  his  heresies,  was  expelled  from  the  He 
brew  Church.  In  a  spirit  of  charity  and  honor  to  his 
erudition,  he  was  accepted  into  the  Christian  Church. 
Herein  he  proved  equally  obnoxious,  and  was  summa 
rily  dismissed,  or  excommunicated.  Nothing  daunted, 
he  published  his  reticent  controversies,  only  to  see 
them  suppressed  or  burnt.  But  he  worked  an  influence 
upon  his  age;  bribery  could  not  tempt  him;  menace  he 
did  not  dread;  and  his  influence  will  endure  forever. 
Nor  is  he  the  first,  nor  the  last  learned  man  whose 
mind  has  failed  to  be  inspired  with  the  transcendent 


396  CALIFORNIA   ANTHOLOGY. 

beauties  of  divine  creation,  or  his  moral  emotions  mel 
lowed  with  the  poetry  and  the  harmonies  of  Nature. 

Since  the  appearance  of  man  on  earth  many  of  the 
great  epochs  of  life,  involving  thousands  of  centuries, 
have  transpired;  but  it  is  not  so  very  many  years  since 
man  discovered  and  reduced  to  order  the  simplest  laws 
and  conditions  of  physics;  the  first  mechanical  data  of 
the  principles  which  govern  force  and  motion ;  the 
scientific  combinations  of  architecture;  the  minute  de 
tails  of  house  carpentry ;  the  incessant  and  so  often 
ruinous  influence  of  gravitation,  on  whose  nice  adjust 
ments  man's  equilibrium,  both  in  full  action  and  repose, 
depends;  the  great  demonstrations  of  geometry,  with 
all  their  applications  in  the  great  areas  of  astronomy- 
all,  all,  are  but  recent,  in  comparison  with  the  evolu 
tions  of  organized  beings,  with  man,  their  highest  type 
on  earth;  and  yet  the  work  of  every  vitalized  organism 
demonstrates  that  the  antecedent  conception  by  a  su 
perior  intelligence  was  indispensable  to  their  existence; 
and  in  their  exquisite  symmetries  are  proved  the  pre- 
knowledge  of  all  the  great  physical  laws. 

The  human  body,  in  general  terms,  consists  of  a 
solid  head,  a  movable  trunk,  supported  by  a  flexible 
column  and  four  limbs.  These  several  members  are 
united  by  joints  or  hinge-work.  It  represents  a  conical 
form,  inverted  with  its  apex,  or,  one  might  say,  its  two 
apices,  resting  on  the  ground  without  any  further 
attachment  than  the  soles  of  the  feet  and  the  attraction 
of  gravity.  Viewed  as  a  mechanism,  you  perceive  that 
this  construction  is  very  unfavorable  for  stability  in  its 
upright  position,  and  would  be  very  easily  overturned. 


MISCELLANY.  397 

Indeed,  if  una»ided  by  a  constant  mutation  of  muscular 
forces  kept  in  play  by  voluntary  efforts,  it  could  only 
maintain  its  upright  position  Jor  a  very  short  time. 
Through  the  centre  of  this  cone  a  vertical  line  repre 
sents  the  line  of  gravitation.  Now  it  is  only  by  care 
ful  obedience,  learned  by  long  experience,  to  the  laws 
of  gravity,  that  this  erect  position  can  be  continued; 
the  various  departures  from  and  returns  to  which  con 
stitute  all  the  movements — as  walking,  leaping,  dancing, 
the  art  of  equitation — which  the  body  assumes.  So 
thoroughly  do  all  these  motions  become  educated  by  the 
action  of  thought  and  will  on  the  muscles  and  joints, 
that  their  voluntary  motions  come  finally  to  appear 
involuntary;  but  in  truth  they  are  never  so.  So  rapidly 
is  the  telegraphy  of  the  brain  conducted  that  we  fail 
to  register  its  time.  As  an  illustration  of  its  perfect 
ability,  all  the  grace  and  rapid  performance  of  a  Fanny 
Elssler  is  but  the  music  of  the  mind  transmitted  to  and 
enacted  by  the  feet,  every  quaver  and  semi-quaver  of 
the  one  being  converted  into  motion  by  the  other. 

This,  then,  is  the  converse  of  the  mind  with  the 
great  system  of  muscles  it  controls;  and  its  perfection 
depends  upon  the  trained  application  of  the  laws  of 
gravitation  and  mechanism  through  the  centre  of  the 
body,  and  the  possible  departures  from  it.  See  the 
exterior  semblance  of  this  grand  mechanical  combina 
tion,  [pointing  to  a  human  statue  divested  of  the  skin] 
and  yet  how  coarse  and  rude  it  all  appears  if  compared 
with  those  unseen  constructions  of  the  eye,  the  -ear, 
and  the  vocal  apparatus.  Is  this  mere  chance?  or  is  it 
the  workmanship  of  a  God? 


398  CALIFORNIA   ANTHOLOGY. 

Religion,  assume  what  cast  it  may  be,  is  only  the 
tender  poetic  child  of  devotion,  and  devotion  is  that 
holy  differentiation  between  godlike  man  and  apelike 
animal ;  that  impassioned  sentiment,  inwrought  of  a 
jealous  Deity,  whose  love  for  His  last  and  best  creation, 
with  the  mother's  for  her  feeble,  willful  infant,  fearing 
and  pre-knowing  ingratitude,  engrafted  this  profoundest 
of  all  emotions  in  its  inmost  nature,  to  secure  its  fidelity. 
This  is  the  differentiation  which  Mr.  Darwin,  in  con 
structing  his  chain  of  many  links,  has  ignored  or  for 
gotten  ;  but  an  all-wise  Creator  so  planted  it  in  every 
human  bosom  from  creation's  dawn,  that  it  is  as  indis 
pensable  as  life  to  existence — all  nations  feel  it,  all 
nations  adore  and  worship.  Riot  over  it  as  they  may, 
the  Creator  ever  attains  His  loving  object;  to  their 
knees  all  races  bend  in  trembling  adoration  at  His 
shrine. — Dr.  A.  B.  Stout. 


THE  SCIENCE  OF  MEDICINE. 
3O5.  The  Science  of  Medicine  in  this  age  of 
the  world  is  endowed  with  marvelous  vitality  and  pro 
gress,  it  draws  richest  nourishment  from  all  parts  of  the 
earth;  and,  fed  at  the  hands  of  thousands  of  loving  and 
earnest  devotees,  its  growth  and  development  are  ob 
jects  of  immeasurable  splendor.  It  leaps  and  bounds 
along  the  plane  of  the  century — swift  and  bright  as  the 
sweep  of  a  comet,  exploding  the  errors  of  the  past- 
dissipating  present  obscurities  and  illuminating  the 
the  future;  untired  by  time,  endowed  with  exhaustless 
energies,  it  knows  no  halting  place  save  the  last  station 


MISCELLANY.  399 

at  which  the  finite  must  stop  and  the  infinite  begin. 
In  the  contemplation  of  this  truth  may  be  perceived 
the  necessity  for  unceasing  labor  and  study  on  the  part 
of  Professors  and  Students;  on  the  part  of  all,  in  fact, 
who  would  keep  pace  with  the  progress  and  improve 
ment  of  our  science,  or  rise  to  distinction  among  the 
savans  of  the  century. 

If  the  "iiltima  thule"  of  our  science  were  reached; 
if  it  were  finished  in  all  its  fair  proportions;  the  degree 
of  labor  necessary  to  attain  this  station  of  knowledge, 
language  is  indequate  to  describe;  and  once  attained, 
the  infirmities  of  memory  are  so  great,  that  it  must 
needs  be  constantly  refreshed  by  study,  or  the  accumu 
lated  learning  of  the  past  would  insensibly  disappear 
and  finally  be  lost  to  the  world  forever. 

In  the  prosecution  then  of  the  study  of  all  unfinished 
sciences,  the  relations  between  the  teacher  and  the 
taught,  between  professor  and  student,  are  not  and  can 
not  be  severely  drawn;  they  stand  more  on  equal  foot 
ing,  something  like  older  and  younger  brothers,  the 
former  guiding,  scarcely  instructing  the  latter,  for  the 
way  after  a  while  is  full  of  difficulty  and  obscurity  to 
all,  and  under  such  circumstances  every  one  is  a  stu 
dent.  No  longer,  then,  are  there  professors  and  pupils; 
ignorance  levels  all  such  distinctions  and  there  is  in 
reality  no  difference  between  them. 

A  community  of  labor,  an  identity  of  interest  and 
equality  of  position,  should  draw  us  very  closely  to 
gether,  making  of  us  a  confraternity  devoted  to  science 
and  to  each  other,  finding  in  each  other  sufficient  reason 
for  attachment,  at  least  in  this,  that  we  have  voluntarily 


400  CALIFORNIA   ANTHOLOGY. 

and  con  amore  given  ourselves  to  a  science  which,  un 
less  we  are  altogether  abandoned,  must  elevate  the  soul 
and  chasten  the  heart,  teaching  us  reverence  for  Him 
who  has  done  all  things  wisely  and  well;  teaching  us 
charity  for  all  men,  sympathy  for  their  misfortunes, 
patience  for  their  transgressions;  teaching  us  our  own 
weakness  and  littleness,  and  the  awful  majesty  of  Om 
nipotence,  making  of  us  all  better  and  wiser  men,  prac 
tical  philanthropists,  working  to  practical  ends  and  aims, 
whose  grand  objective  is  the  relief  of  all  the  ills  that 
flesh  is  heir  to,  all  the  mental  and  physical  infirmities 
of  mankind. 

It  is  in  medicine,  and  in  medicine  alone,  that  benevo 
lence  finds  a  field  for  its  fullest  scope,  wondrous  fore 
sight,  exhaustless  energies  and  most  signal  triumphs. 
Benevolence  that  leans  not  upon  medicine  nor  invokes 
her  aid  in  the  consummation  of  its  mission  is  indeed  a 
most  impotent  virtue. 

On  the  face  of  all  nature  are  impressed,  sometimes 
indistinctly,  sometimes  in  frightful  perspicuity,  the  char 
acters  of  suffering,  disease  and  death.  Take  from  the 
mead,  where  an  emerald  waving  sea  of  luxuriant  fresh 
ness  proclaims  the  perfection  of  life,  a  single  blade  of 
grass  and  examine  carefully  the  structure.  A  minute 
perforation  in  one  portion  tells  the  story  that  a  destruc 
tive  worm  has  been  there;  in  another  portion  a  blight 
or  mould  announces  that  some  mysterious  chemical  ac 
tion  or  physical  vicissitude  has  commenced  a  series  of 
processes  whose  climax  is  death.  The  leaf  that  flutters 
from  the  tree  and  falls  at  your  feet  in  your  rambles 
through  the  forest,  is  a  sermon  in  miniature  on  the  de- 


MISCELLANY.  401 

cay  and  death  which  fasten  themselves  inevitably  on 
all  organized  bodies.  Death  is  indeed  one  of  the  con 
ditions  of  life.  Wherever  we  see  life,  no  matter  in  how 
humble  or  exalted  way  it  manifests  its  presence,  death 
is  the  inseparable  associate  of  its  continuance.  In  the 
disintegration  of  the  blood,  for  instance,  may  be  per 
ceived  an  illustration  of  this  truth.  The  red  corpuscles, 
in  giving  to  life  the  nourishment  necessary  for  the  per 
fection  of  its  operations,  are  weakened  and  ultimately 
destroyed,  and  their  inanimate  remains  helplessly  sur 
render  themselves  to  certain  chemical  actions,  assume 
new  relations  in  the  system,  or  through  the  various 
emunctories  finally  find  an  exit  from  the  body.  The 
moment  that  digestion  fails  to  replace  with  new  cor 
puscular  elements  those  which  life  has  used,  and  in 
using  destroyed,  then  death,  universal  death,  ensues. 

Running  up  the  scale  of  creation,  commencing  at 
the  point  where  the  senses  almost  fail  to  demonstrate 
the  existence  of  life,  and  ending  in  the  sublimest  forms 
of  physical  and  intellectual  powers,  the  same  general 
law  obtains,  the  germs  of  disease  and  death  are  there, 
they  may  remain  for  a  time  undeveloped,  some  inter- 
current  trouble  may  anticipate  the  unavoidable  casualty ; 
care  may  retard  for  a  season  the  evolution  of  these 
germs,  but  sooner  or  later  they  pronounce  themselves 
and  then  the  instinct  of  self-preservation  calls  aloud  for 
help. 

What  was  true  in  reference  to  the  blade  of  grass  or 
the  falling  leaf,  is  equally  true  in  reference  to  man,  to 
whom  all  sublunary  things  are  subordinate:  for  whose 
use  and  comfort  they  were  indeed  created.  There  is 


402  CALIFORNIA    ANTHOLOGY. 

no  spot,  there  is  no  clime  throughout  God's  universe 
wherein  are  found  the  habitations  of  man  which  are  not 
darkened  by  distemper  and  desolated  by  death.  The 
wail  that  in  remote  antiquity  rent  the  startled  atmos 
phere,  when  bloody  assassination,  done  by  a  brother's 
hand,  spilt  the  first  blood,  destroyed  for  the  first  time  a 
human  life,  has  been  sounding  through  the  centuries 
ever  since,  and  the  dismal  melancholy  diapason  will  be 
hushed  only  on  the  consummation  of  the  planet  on 
which  we  live.  Early  and  late,  at  midnight  and  at  noon, 
from  the  four  winds  of  heaven,  from  city,  hamlet  and 
plain,  from  the  palaces  of  the  rich  and  great,  and  from 
the  hovel  of  the  wretched  and  the  poor,  comes  that 
never-ceasing  cry  of  agony,  moaning  over  the  sick, 
wailing  over  the  dying,  and  shrieking  over  the  dead. 
In  the  presence,  then,  of  such  dreadful  truths,  whose 
universality  is  so  perfectly  established,  and  reflecting 
that  medicine  is  the  only  power  that  can  cope  with 
nature's  infirmities  as  manifested  in  the  human  family, 
who  is  mad  or  impious  enough  to  doubt  that  benevolence 
finds  in  medicine  a  field  for  its  most  comprehensive 
scope.  Working  in  harmony,  medicine  and  benevo 
lence  present  a  combination  whose  triumphs  are  in  the 
strictest  sense  miraculous,  approaching  in  majesty  and 
splendor  the  wonders  wrought  by  Him,  in  whose  pres 
ence  the  conscious  water  saw  its  God  and  blushed! 

—Dr.  y.  Campbell  S/iorb. 

THE  LAW,  BENCH  AND  BAR. 

3O6.     The  province  of  the  law  is  as  wide  and  com 
prehensive  as  the  requirements — natural  and  artificial— 


MISCELLANY.  403 

of  human  society.  Wherever  a  political  organization  has 
existed,  its  elements  have  been  combined  and  held  to 
gether  by  law.  Indeed,  without  law,  such  an  organi 
zation  could  not  exist — it  is  its  vivifying  and  sustain 
ing  spirit.  The  completeness,  justice  and  efficiency 
of  a  nation's  laws  constitute  perhaps  the  one  infallible 
test  of  its  true  advance  along  the  line  of  civilization; 
for,  as  has  been  shown  by  Savigny,  the  progress  of 
legislation  is  not  governed  by  chance,  but  is  the  ex 
pression  of  the  very  life  of  a  people.  The  primary, 
fundamental  conceptions  which  distinguish  the  juris 
prudence  of  one  people,  of  one  age,  from  another, 
illustrate  most  clearly  the  habits  of  thought  and  action, 
the  beliefs  and  sentiments  of  the  respective  times  and 
peoples.  They  indicate  the  character  of  the  prevailing 
industries — the  relation  of  the  governors  to  the  gov 
erned — of  nation  to  nation.  Material  progress  and 
mental  and  moral  advance — man's  view  of  his  duty 
to  his  fellow  man  and  his  relation  to  the  unseen 
world — may  be  read  in  the  juridicial  records  of  human 
government,  even  as  the  geologist  sees  in  the  various 
strata  of  the  earth  the  history  of  its  formation.  And 
as  the  history  of  man  transcends  in  interest  and  im 
portance  the  history  of  the  globe  which  he  inhabits,  it 
would  seem  that  the  studies,  contemplations  and  re 
flections  of  the  juristic  explorer  must  necessarily  lead 
to  results  surpassing  in  grandeur  and  usefulness  the  mi 
nute  and  laborious  observation  and  profound  generali 
zations  of  the  physical  discoverer.  The  sphere  of  the 
latter  has  fixed  limits — that  of  the  former  has  no 
boundaries  but  those  beyond  which  the  mental  and 


404 


CALIFORNIA    ANTHOLOGY. 


moral  capacities  of  the  race  cannot  go.  These  rules, 
by  which  the  conduct  of  man  as  a  social  being-  is  gov 
erned — by  many  not  always  consciously  felt,  and  recog 
nized  dimly,  if  at  all — are  yet  as  universal  and  potent 
in  their  domain  as  those  natural  forces  which  guide  the 
courses  of  the  planets,  and  shape  the  perfect  sphere  of 
the  dew-drop  on  the  rose. 

In  the  practical  application  of  these  rules  to  the  mani 
fold  phases  of  human  intercourse — in  the  enforcement 
of  obligations  upon  which  the  protection  of  life,  liberty 
and  property  depends — appropriate  instrumentalities  are 
demanded.  These  are  what  we  term  the  Bench  and 
Bar.  In  one  view,  their  functions  are  clearly  distin 
guishable,  but  practically  the  one  is  essential  to  the 
other.  Whether  the  old  conception  of  each  judicial  deci 
sion  being  a  direct  and  special  emanation  from  the  Deity, 
or  the  other  view  that  judicial  duty  consists  in  merely 
applying  a  well-known  rule  to  a  given  state  of  facts,  pre 
vail,  the  necessity  for  a  class  which  shall  present  prop 
erly  each  dispute  for  determination  must  be  generally 
recognized.  "The  advocate,"  says  the  great  French 
Chancellor,  "is  placed  for  the  public  good,  between  the 
tumult  of  human  passions  and  the  throne  of  justice,  to 
offer  the  prayers  of  the  people,  and  to  bear  back  the 
response  of  the  law."  The  responsibility  devolving 
upon  the  lawyer  is,  and  necessarily  must  be,  of 
the  most  weighty,  important,  and  at  times  awful 
nature.  Life,  liberty,  property,  character  are  entrusted 
to  his  keeping.  To  his  honor,  be  it  said,  that  weighed 
in  the  balance,  he  has  rarely  been  found  wanting.  The 
history  of  English  and  American  liberty  is  resplendent 


MISCELLANY.  405 

with  the  names  of  lawyers  who  have  battled  as  bravely 
and  successfully  in  the  forum  for  that  sacred  cause,  as 
any  plumed  knight  or  mailed  baron  in  field  or  fortress. 
Whether  in  the  humbler  walks  of  the  profession  or 
along  its  mountain  tops,  the  labors  of  the  lawyer  are 
always  useful  and  sometimes  indispensable.  He,  at 
least,  should  be  "faithful  among  the  faithless."  Whether 
his  office  be  that  of  priest  or  acolyte  in  the  sacred  tem 
ple  of  Justice,  he  must  \x.  faithful — faithful  to  his  client, 
to  society,  to  himself.  To  his  consciousness  should 
ever  be  present  that  most  impressive  injunction: 

"To  thine  own  self  be  true, 
And  it  must  follow,  as  the  night  the  day, 
Thou  canst  not  then  be  false  to  any  man." 

—Henry  H.  Reid. 

3O7.  THE  LIVES  OF  Coke,  Plowden,  Mansfield, 
Kenyon,  Marshall,  Story,  and  a  host  of  others,  honest, 
sincere,  learned  and  resolute  men,  have  been  spent  in 
the  examination  of  laws,  in  studying  them  profoundly, 
with  reference  to  the  eternal  fitness  of  things,  and  the 
wants  of  a  civilized  community.  \  It  is  no  easy  thing 
to  frame  a  system  of  laws  which  shall  provide  for  every 
one  of  the  strangely  complicated  combinations  of  so 
ciety;  such  a  system  must  be  the  growth  of  ages,  the 
fruit  of  long  reflection  and  still  longer  experience;  and 
when  it  is  finished  and  complete,  the  breath  of  lawless 
ness  and  irreverence  can  destroy  in  a  single  day  what 
centuries  of  disinterested,  intelligent,  reverent  work 
have  reareck]  I  never  go  into  Court  and  hear  the  judge 
render  his  decision  in  a  civil  case  where  large  property 


406  CALIFORNIA   ANTHOLOGY. 

interests  are  settled,  or  speak  the  sentence  by  which  a 
human  being  is  adjudged  unworthy  to  live,  without  a 
feeling  that  something  more  than  the  utterance  of  a 
human  being  is  issuing  from  his  lips.  I  recognize  in 
the  Judge,  as  he  performs  his  solemn  task,  a  being, 
clothed  for  the  moment,  with  the  attributes  of  Divinity 
itself;  the  humble  court-room  swells  into  the  dimen 
sions  of  a  grand  temple  of  justice,  where  the  vice 
gerent  of  God  presides. 

Whatever  view  partisans  may  take  of  the  trial  of 
President  Johnson,,  at  Washington,  all  will  be  agreed 
on  one  point,  and  that  is  that  the  possibility  of  such  a 
trial,  the  trial  of  the  Chief  Magistrate  of  the  nation,  of 
the  Grand  Commander  of  our  armies  and  High  Admiral 
of  our  navy,  before  a  court  of  Representatives  of  the 
people,  that  trial  taking  place  at  a  time  when  the  angry 
feelings  of  war  had  hardly  commenced  to  abate,  is  the 
best  illustration  of  the  wisdom,  and  the  surest  guaranty 
of  the  permanence  of  the  institutions  of  the  United 
States.  No  such  trial  could  be  possible  except  under 
a  government  of  the  people.  Brutus  killed  his  best 
friend  for  the  love  of  Rome,  and  the  hope  of  the  Re 
public  rested  on  the  dagger  of  the  assassin.  The  spirit 
of  English  liberty,  brutally  repressed  by  the  tyranny  of 
Henry  the  Eighth,  stayed  in  its  progress  by  the  genius 
and  womanhood  of  Elizabeth,  fretting  and  chafing 
under  the  pedantic  claim  of  James  the  First  to  rule  by 
divine  right,  at  length  wields  the  ax,  and  as  it  falls  on 
the  neck  of  Charles  the  First,  the  martyred  king,  the 
great  poet  of  republics,  and  of  the  rights  of  man — the 
gentle  Milton — stands  applauding,  proclaiming  that  a 


MISCELLANY.  407 

deed,  great,  good,  and  essential  to  England's  progress, 
has  been  performed.  There  was  no  other  means  by 
which  liberty  could  assert  herself.  "Son  of  Saint  Louis, 
ascend  to  Heaven!"  cries  the  priest,  and  the  innocent, 
harmless  Louis  the  Sixteenth  mounts  the  scaffold,  a 
necessary  victim,  when  it  is  a  question  of  changing  a 
dynasty,  which  rests  on  force. 

"Andrew  Johnson,  come  into  Court!"  shouts  the 
crier,  and  humbly  pleading  that  he  is  not  guilty;  that 
counsel,  learned  in  the  law,  will  prove  to  his  judges  that 
he  ought  not  to  vacate  his  place  of  monarch ;  the  elected 
of  thirty  millions  of  freemen,  submits  himself  to  the  law 
and  asks  its  decision  whether  he  shall  reign  or  not. 
Has  the  world  ever  seen  a  greater, triumph  of  law? 

— John  B.  Felton. 

8O8.  SCIENCE  is  A  COLLECTION  OF  TRUTHS;  an  art 
is  a  collection  of  rules  for  conduct.  The  end  of  science 
is  truth ;  the  end  of  art  is  work.  Since  science  is  con 
versant  about  speculative  knowledge  only,  and  art  is 
the  application  of  knowledge  to  practice,  jurisprudence, 
when  applied  to  practice,  is  an  art,  whether  in  enacting 
laws  as  in  legislation,  or  in  the  actual  working  of  the 
law  as  in  advocacy;  but  jurisprudence,  when  confined 
to  the  theory  of  law,  is  strictly  a  science.  Law  as  an 
art  aims  at  the  practical  object  of  improving  the  con 
dition  of  men  in  their  social  conditions;  it  has  reference 
to  conduct;  by  which  we  mean  all  that  directly  involves 
the  relation  of  men  to  one  another.  When  this  is 
done,  law,  as  an  art,  is  satisfied.  But  then  arise  further 
questions.  Why  is  one  law  better  than  another?  What 

28 


408  CALIFORNIA    ANTHOLOGY. 

is  the  ultimate  nature  of  law?  Whence  does  law 
arise?  It  is  the  science  which  deals  with  such  questions, 
and  when  it  has  ascertained  this,  it  is  satisfied.  It  is 
true  that  the  science  assists  the  art,  but  that  is  not  so 
much  the  object  of  the  science.  The  science  arises 
from  human  inquisitiveness,  proceeding  in  the  same 
spirit  of  inquiry  which  leads  men  to  search  the  rocks 
and  caves  in  the  bowels  of  the  earth,  examine  its  strata, 
and  thus  form  the  science  of  geology. 

The  true  aim  and  object  of  all  human  enactments, 
the  real  art  of  legislation,  should  be  to  define  and  es 
tablish  the  relative  rights  of  men;  it  should  not,  it  cannot 
interfere  with  their  absolute  natural  rights.  It  is  in  this 
respect  that  law  has  had  its  chief  imperfections,  and 
where  it  needs  most  to  be  guided  by  science;  and  the 
aid  of  science  will  enable  us,  by  a  study  of  men  in  their 
social  relations,  to  discover  principles  on  which  laws 
may  be  based,  directing  and  controlling  their  conduct. 
By  a  study,  of  Sociology  and  Political  Economy  we 
have  attained  to  a  knowledge  of  certain  principles  which 
we  know  to  be  uniform,  steady  and  coristant  in  their 
operation,  wherever  there  is  any  social  organization; 
and  in  so  far  as  positive  law  is  based  on  a  recognition 
of  these  principles,  it  may  be  claimed  to  be  scientific. 

—John  Prof  alt,  LL.  B. 

3O9.  THE  CONSTITUTION  of  the  United  States 
guards  with  jealous  care  the  liberty  of  the  citizen.  It 
provides  that  he  shall  be  free  from  arrest,  except  upon 
warrant  issued  upon  probable  cause,  supported  by  oath 
or  affirmation.  But  the  Constitution  was  established 


MISCELLANY.  409 

not  only  for  times  of  peace;  not  only  for  times  when  a 
ready  obedience  to  the  laws  is  yielded  by  citizens,  but 
also  for  times  of  rebellion,  of  war,  and  invasion;  and  it 
contains  within  itself  all  the  power  requisite  for  the 
maintenance  of  the  Government  against  both  foreign 
and  domestic  foes.  The  Government  must  exist,  or 
the  citizen  cannot  enjoy  the  liberty  which  the  Constitu 
tion  intends  to  secure.  And  that  the  Government  may 
exist,  the  liberty  of  the  individual  must  sometimes  yield 
to  the  demands  of  public  safety.  The  very  clause  of 
the  Constitution  which  declares  that  the  privilege  of  the 
writ  of  habeas  corpus  shall  not  be  suspended,  makes 
the  exception,  "  unless  when,  in  cases  of  rebellion  or 
invasion,  the  public  safety  may  require  it." — Judge 
Stephen  J.  Field. 

31O.  A  JUDGE  is  expected  to  have  the  feelings  and 
sympathy  of  a  man ;  yet,  in  his  decisions  he  should 
pronounce  the  law  irrespective  of  circumstances,  and 
let  its  majesty  hush  all  other  considerations.  The  prin 
ciple  is  a  plain  one,  but  its  practice  in  some  cases  is 
exceedingly  difficult.  We  are  liable  to  be  influenced 
by  surrounding  circumstances  in  spite  of  ourselves, 
and  in  many  cases  unconsciously  to  ourselves.  A 
consciousness  of  the  difficulty,  instead  of  enabling  us 
to  avoid  it,  frequently  unsettles  the  mind,  destroys  the 
judgment,  and  causes  us  to  rush  upon  the  rock  we 
would  fain  avoid.  A  sense  of  injustice  that  may  be 
done,  presses  itself  with  force  upon  the  mind  and 
jostles  it  from  its  propriety.  A  feeling  of  this  weak 
ness  causes  it  like  the  pendulum  to  oscillate  perchance 


410  CALIFORNIA    ANTHOLOGY. 

to  the  other  side  of  truth,  in  its  effort  to  assert  the 
majesty  of  the  law.  Thus,  in  attempting  to  sail  be 
tween  Scylla  and  Chary bdis,  a  Judge  is  in  danger  of 
touching  both. — Judge  D.  O.  Skattuck. 

311.  IN 'TIMES  of  great  public  excitement,  opinions 
of  men  on  given  subjects  of  duty,   often  change  from 
one  extreme  to  another;  but,  for  all  that,  something  is 
necessarily  due  in  every   country   to   the   views   of  life 
and  duty  as  they   may  prevail  amongst  men.     Such 
opinions  are  presumed  to  be  based  upon   what  is  be 
lieved,  for  the  time,  to  correctly  admeasure   the  duties 
of  men,  and  to  square  their  conduct  with  such  duties. 
Often  mistaken  as  public  opinion  is,  time  and  the  various 
events  which  supervene  in  the  course  of  human  con 
duct,  furnish  a  corrective  for  such   errors,   and   enable 
wrongs  to  be  redressed  not  with  too  great  suddenness, 
but  rather  with  such  deliberation  and  healthy  progress 
as    that   great    harm    may    not    arise    from    roo   rapid 
changes  of  public  sentiment. — Judge  O.   C.  Pratt. 

312.  THE  MOST  distinguished  lawyers  earned  their 
proudest    laurels    in    the    battles   in   which   they   were, 
obliged,  in  behalf  of  the  liberties  of  the  people,  to  war 
against    the   oppressions   and   tyranny   of  the  Courts. 
The  legal   profession   is  also  of  all   others  fearless   of 
public  opinion.      It  is  of  all  others  candid  and  sympa 
thetic.      It  has  ever  stood  up  against   the   tyranny  of 
monarchs,   on  the  one  hand,  and  the  tyranny  of  public 
opinion,  on  the  other.     And  if  as  the  humblest  among 
them  it  becomes  me  to  instance  myself,  I  may  say  with 


MISCELLANY.  411 

a  bold  heart — and  I  do  say  it  with  a  bold  heart — that 
there  is  not  in  all  this  world  a  wretch  so  humble,  so 
guilty,  so  despairing,  so  torn  with  avenging  furies,  so 
pursued  by  the  vengeance  of  the  law,  so  hunted  to  cities 
of  refuge,  so  fearful  of  life,  so  afraid  of  death — there  is 
no  wretch  so  deeply  steeped  in  all  the  agonies  of  vice 
and  misery  and  crime — that  I  would  not  have  a  heart 
to  listen  to  his  cry,  and  find  a  tongue  to  speak  in  his 
defence,  though  around  his  head  all  the  fury  of  public 
opinion  should  gather  and  rage  and  roar  and  roll,  as 
the  ocean  rolls  around  the  rock.  And  if  I  ever 
forget,  if  I  ever  deny,  that  highest  duty  of  my  profes 
sion,  may  God  palsy  this  arm  and  hush  this  voice  for 
ever. — Gen.  E.  D.  Baker. 

313.  THE  UNITY  OF  LAWS  must  be  in  some  power 
behind  them.  All  law  is  will;  will,  that  is  law,  is  one 
as  the  sun;  law,  many  as  the  rays.  As  every  ray  is  all 
sun,  so  every  law  is  all  will.  If  a  stone  fall  to  the 
earth,  it  falls  by  the  act  of  some  will.  If  sap  rises  in 
the  tree,  it  does  so  by  the  act  of  some  will.  If  heat  is 
transformed  into  electricity,  or  electricity  into  heat,  the 
correlation  is  the  act  of  some  will.  Every  manifesta 
tion  in  matter  is  the  manifestation  of  supreme,  unre- 
sisted  will.  In  conduct,  morality  is  the  domination  of 
superhuman  will,  and  immorality  the  opposition  of 
human  to  this  superhuman  will.  It  is  therefore  a  law 
only  unto  itself,  and  so  unto  nothing,  for  by  itself  noth 
ing  is. 

We  find  the  same  method  of  evolution  in  both  physi 
cal  and  moral  forces.  If  matter  integrates  and  motion 


412  CALIFORNIA    ANTHOLOGY. 

is  dissipaled,  so  in  morals — ideas  unify  and  agitation 
ceases.  If  heat  is  correlated  into  electricity,  or  the 
reverse,  so  in  morals — the  less  of  virtue,  the  more  of 
vice.  The  method  of  correlation  is  as  exact  and  inexo 
rable  in  the  one  case  as  in  the  other.  The  same  way 
indicates  the  same  will. 

Therefore,  what  we  are  accustomed  to  call  the  laws 
or  facts  of  nature,  are  the  omnipresent,  perpetual  law- 
making,  the  continuous  willing,  the  living  law,  the 
unadjourned  legislature  of  some  supernal  will.  Essen 
tially,  nothing  is  fixed.  All  things  exist  in  will,  and  will 
may  change  its  manifestations.  Will  is  eternal,  and 
nothing  abides  apart  from  its  decisions.  In  its  unity  is 
the  unity  of  law.  All  opposing  will  is  not  law,  but 
lawlessness — Rev.  Wm.  H.  Platt. 


THE    COMMON     AND     CIVIL     LAW    CON 
TRASTED. 

314.  The  Common  Law  is  that  system  of  juris 
prudence  which,  deducing  its  origin  from  the  traditionary 
customs  and  simple  laws  of  the  Saxons,  becoming 
blended  with  many  of  the  customs  and  laws  of  the 
Normans,  enriched  with  the  most  valuable  portions 
of  the  Civil  Law,  modified  and  enlarged  by  numer 
ous  Acts  of  the  English  Parliament,  smoothed  in  its 
asperities  and  moulded  into  shape  by  a  succession  of  as 
learned  and  wise  and  sagacious  intellects  as  the  world  ever 
saw,  has  grown  up,  during  the  lapse  of  centuries,  under 


MISCELLANY.  413 

the  reformed  religion  and  enlightened  philosophy  and 
literature  of  England,  and  has  come  down  to  us, 
amended  and  improved  by  American  Legislation,  and 
adapted  to  the  republican  principles  and  energetic  char 
acter  of  the  American  people.  To  that  system  the 
world  is  indebted  for  whatever  it  enjoys  of  free  govern 
ment,  of  political  and  religious  liberty,  of  untrammeled 
legislation,  and  unbought  administration  of  justice.  To 
that  system  do  we  now  owe  the  institution  of  trial  by 
jury,  and  the  privileges  of  the  writ  of  Habeas  Corpus, 
both  equally  unknown  in  the  Civil  Law.  Under  that 
system  all  the  great  branches  of  human  industry — 
agriculture,  commerce,  and  manufactures — enjoy  equal 
protection  and  equal  favor;  and  under  that,  less  than 
under  any  scheme  ever  devised  by  the  wisdom  of  man, 
has  personal  liberty  been  subject  to  the  restrictions  and 
assaults  of  prerogative  and  arbitrary  power. 

The  Civil  Law,  on  the  other  hand,  is  that  system 
which,  based  upon  the  crude  laws  of  a  rough,  fierce 
people,  whose  passion  was  war,  and  whose  lust,  con 
quest — received,  in  its  progress  through  the  various 
stages  of  civilization  from  barbarism  to  refinement,  a 
variety  of  additions  and  alterations,  from  the  Plebiscita 
of  the  Roman  Plebeians,  from  the  Senatus-consulta  of 
the  Roman  Senate,  from  the  decrees  of  Consuls  and 
Tribunes,  from  the  adjudications  of  praetors,  from  the 
responses  of  men  learned  in  the  law,  and  from  the 
edicts  and  rescripts  of  the  tyrants  of  Rome,  until,  in  the 
early  ages  of  Christianity,  the  whole  chaotic  mass  was, 
by  the  order  and  under  the  patronage  of  the  Emperor 
Justinian,  systemized,  reduced  into  form,  and  pro- 


414  CALIFORNIA   ANTHOLOGY. 

mulgated  for  observance  by  the  Roman  people,  in  the 
shape  of  four  books  called  the  Institutes,  fifty  books 
known  as  the  Pandects,  and  certain  additional  edicts, 
designated  as  the  Novels  of  Justinian.  Thereafter,  and 
until  the  final  downfall  of  the  Eastern  Empire 'of  Rome, 
the  Justinian  code  furnished  the  guide  for  legal  tribu 
nals  throughout  the  provinces  subject  to  the  Imperial 
sway,  in  all  cases  political,  civil,  and  criminal,  except  so 
far  as  particular  decisions  were  commanded,  annulled, 
or  modified  by  the  will  of  despotic  power.  But,  as, 
century  after  century,  wave  upon  wave  of  Northern 
barbarism  poured  down  on  the  effeminacy  of  Southern 
Europe,  sparing  in  its  course  neither  the  intellectual  nor 
the  material  monuments  of  civilization,  the  administra 
tion  of  Roman  law  was,  in  city  after  city,  and  province 
after  province,  gradually  obliterated,  at  the  same  time, 
and  to  the  same  extent,  that  Roman  power  was  crushed, 
and  Roman  institutions  demolished.  The  whole  sys 
tem  of  Justinian  was  at  length  swept  from  the  face  of 
the  earth,  or  buried  in  the  recesses  of  cloisters,  alike 
forgotten  and  unknown.  In  the  twelfth  century,  how 
ever,  a  copy  of  it  was  accidentally  discovered  at  Amalfi, 
in  Italy;  and,  owing  to  the  arbitrary  nature  of  some  of 
its  provisions,  as  well  as  to  the  wisdom  and  excellence 
of  its  general  features,  it  was  seized  upon  with  avidity 
by  the  clergy,  as  favorable  to  their  spiritual  authority, 
and  by  monarchs,  as  conducive  to  the  support  of  their 
despotic  power.  It  was  at  once  taught  in  the  schools, 
studied  in  the  convents,  sanctioned  by  kings,  and  com 
mended  by  the  Holy  Father  himself,  who  held  the 
keys  of  heaven.  In  a  few  years  it  became  the  prevail- 


MISCELLANY.  415 

ing  system  of  laws  throughout  most  of  that  portion 
of  Europe,  in  which  the  founder  of  Christianity  was 
respected,  and  the  saints  and  martyrs  adored.  Thus, 
as  in  earlier  times,  the  fine  arts,  literature,  philosophy, 
and  graceful  superstitions  of  Greece,  had  captivated 
the  rude  minds  and  softened  the  stern  natures  of  the 
Roman  people;  so,  centuries  afterwards,  the  refined 
system  of  Roman  jurisprudence  overthrew  the  uncouth 
customs  and  ill-digested  laws  of  it  conquerors,  and  led 
captive  kings  and  nobles,  clergy  and  laity,  in  the  pro 
gress  of  its  triumphal  procession.  With  the  exception 
of  England  alone,  the  code  of  Justinian  became  en 
grafted  upon  the  local  institutions  of  each  separate  prin 
cipality  and  kingdom,  and  constituted  a  general  system 
of  European  law;  but,  neither  the  favor  of  kings,  the 
denunciations  of  priests,  nor  even  the  fulminations 
from  the  Papal  See  itself,  could  induce  the  English 
barons,  or  the  English  Courts,  or  the  English  people, 
to  receive  it  as  a  substitute  for  their  own  favorite  and 
immemorial  customs.  At  this  early  period,  then,  when 
the  dawn  of  a  new  civilization  was  just  beginning  to 
burst  upon  the  world,  the  kingdoms  of  Europe,  though 
united  in  religious  institutions,  were  divided  in  reverence 
for  laws.  That  division  has  continued  to  the  present 
day;  and  has  also  extended  over  the  islands  and  conti 
nents,  not  then  known,  but  since  discovered  and  occu 
pied.  Wherever  the  English  flag  has  been  unfurled 
upon  a  savage  or  hostile  shore,  possession  has  been 
taken  in  the  name  of  its  sovereign,  and  in  behalf  of  its 
laws;  and  upon  whatever  coast  an  English  colony  has 
been  planted,  there  also  have  the  colonists  established 


41  G  CALIFORNIA    ANTHOLOGY. 

the  Common  Law,  and  have  ever  afterwards  clung  to  it 
as  the  birthright  of  themselves  and  their  children,  with  a 
tenacity  that  no  power,  no  suffering,  no  fear  of  danger, 
no  hope  of  reward,  could  induce  them  to  relax.  In  the 
same  way  has  the  Roman  or  Civil  Law  gone  hand  in 
hand  with  the  extended  dominion  of  the  continental 
nations  of  Europe.  Thus  it  happens  that,  at  the  pres 
ent  time,  the  whole  christianized  world  is  ruled  by  one 
system  or  the  other.  England,  her  colonies  in  all  parts 
of  the  globe,  and  the  United  States,  with  the  exception 
of  Louisiana,  adhere  to  the  Common  Law;  whilst,  ex 
cepting  Russia  and  Turkey,  the  nations  on  the  continent 
of  Europe,  Mexico,  Guatamala,  all  the  republics  of 
South  America,  together  with  the  Empire  of  Brazil, 
maintain  the  supremacy  of  the  Civil  Law,  with  certain 
restrictions,  limitations  and  additions,  necessary  to  adapt 
it  to  the  peculiar  organization  of  each  particular  State. 
It  would  be  a  curious,  if  not  an  instructive  subject  of 
inquiry,  were  it  possible  to  arrive  at  a  satisfactory  con 
clusion,  to  ascertain  how  far  the  intellectual  and  moral 
condition  of  the  people  of  those  countries  in  which  the 
Civil  Law  prevails,  has  been  produced  by  their  legal 
system,  and  what  influence  the  free  principles  and  exact 
justice  of  the  Common  Law  have  exercised  in  develop 
ing  the  sturdy,  sagacious,  and  self-relying  spirit  of  the 
English  and  American  people.  To  whatever  cause  it 
may  be  owing,  it  is  nevertheless  true,  that  with  a  few  rare 
exceptions  on  either  side,  there  is  a  strongly  marked 
boundary  between  the  domains  of  the  respective  sys 
tems.  In  the  one,  you  perceive  the  activity,  the  throng, 
the  tumult  of  business  life — in  the  other,  the  stagnation 


MISCELLANY.  417 

of  an  inconsiderable  and  waning  trade;  in  the  one,  the 
boldness,  the  impetuosity,  the  invention  of  advancing 
knowledge  and  civilization — in  the  other,  feebleness  of 
intellect,  timidity  of  spirit,  and  the  subserviency  of 
slaves;  in  the  one,  the  strength  and  freshness  of  man 
hood — in  the  other,  the  weakness  of  incipient  decay. 
The  one  possesses  a  progressive  and  reforming  nature 
— the  other  partakes  of  quietude  and  repose;  the  one 
is  the  genius  of  the  present  and  the  future — the  other, 
the  spirit  of  the  past;  the  one  is  full  of  energetic  and 
vigorous  life — the  other,  replete  with  the  memories  of 
a  by-gone  and  antiquated  order  of  things. — Judge 
Natfianiel  Bennett. 


NATURE. 

316.  Every  mountain  upholds  and  supports  the 
herbage  on  its  slopes,  and  sends  down  rills  to  carry  off 
soil  to  the  vales  and  plains,  while  they  feed  herbage 
there.  You  cannot  find  a  tree,  or  plant  or  flower,  that 
lives  for  itself.  The  animal  world  breathes  out  gases 
for  the  vegetable  kingdom,  and  then  the  vegetable 
world  exhales  or  stores  up  some  elements  essential  to 
animal  health  and  vigor.  The  carbonic  acid  we  breathe 
out  here,  and  which  is  poison  to  us,  blown  eastward  by 
our  west  winds,  may  be  greedily  taken  up  a  few  days 
hence,  by  vineyards  on  the  slopes  of  the  Sierra,  and  be 
returned  to  us  in  the  sweetness  of  the  grape.  The 
equator  sends  greeting  to  the  arctic  zone  by  the  warm 
gulf  stream  that  flows  near  the  polar  coasts  to  soften 


418  CALIFORNIA    ANTHOLOGY. 

their  winds.  The  poles  return  a  colder  stream,  and  add 
an  embassy  of  icebergs,  too,  to  temper  the  fierce  heats. 
Selfishness  is  condemned  by  the  still  harmonies  of  the 
creation.  Perfect  order  issues  out  of  interwoven  ser 
vice. —  Thos.  Starr  King. 

316.  RECOGNIZING  the  fact  that  his  body  is  formed 
and  composed  of  the  same  elements  as  the  air,  the 
grass,  and  the  insensate  stone,  and  having  run  its 
course,  shall  return  to  its  original  elements,  man  has 
always  struggled  in  his  beliefs,  to  connect  his  soul  in  its 
origin,  nature, office,  and  end,  with  the  universe  it  inhabits. 
Without  arts  or  civilization,  men  made  themselves  a 
part  of  the  universe.  The  glory  of  the  heavens  was 
theirs,  with  all  their  newness.  Without  knowledge  they 
wandered  entranced  in  peace,  and  wondered  at  the 
new  creation.  They  saw  they  were  subjected  to  the 
control  of  invisible  forces,  and  their  emotions  became 
so  strongly  excited  as  to  demand  the  deification  of  all 
those  unseen  powers,  in  forms  which  their  own  imagi 
nations  and  passions  suggested.  Such  was  the  origin 
of  those  forms  of  religious  belief,  which  coming  from 
the  East,  the  birth  place  of  man,  still  survive  in  the 
creeds  of  to-day.  Nor  does  the  soul  manifest  less 
eagerness  in  communion  with  nature  now  than  in  earlier 
times.  Soiled  with  sin,  we  seek  the  forests  and  the 
mountains,  and  are  made  better  by  their  influence. 
Cast  to  the  earth  by  our  enemy,  mortified  by  our  weak 
ness  and  mistakes,  we  but  touch  the  earth,  and  like 
Anteus,  the  earth-born,  we  rebound  stronger  than 
before.  And  if  tired  at  last  with  contests  that  never 


MISCELLANY. 


end,  with  efforts  that  seem  fruitless  for  good,  we  retire 
to  country  homes,  where  nature  delights  us  with  all  her 
sights  and  sounds,  sweet  is  the  odor  of  new-mown  hay, 
the  breath  of  cows,  fair  the  broad  brows  of  our  oxen 
that  never  deceived  us.  Jocund  is  the  song  of  birds, 
pleasant  the  rustling  of  leaves,  the  babble  of  waters; 
and  if  the  thought  obtrudes  that  the  turf  on  which  we 
lie  is  finally  to  cover  us,  we  are  glad  to  believe  that 
while  of  the  form  that  is  ours  there  shall  not  remain 
one  vestige,  there  shall  still  survive  in  grass  and  tree 
and  flower,  in  forms  of  use  and  of  supernal  elegance 
and  beauty,  all  that  once  was  the  habitation  of  an 
immortal  soul.  —  J.  McM.  Shafter. 

317.  IT  is  the  glory  of  Nature  that  her  laws  dip 
into  every  part  of  the  universe,  making  the  oscillating 
planets  keep  time,  the  varying  temperatures  play  into 
zones,  and  holding  man  as  well  as  the  planet  and  the 
pebble,  and  every  state  and  empire  as  well  as  every 
man,  in  the  coil  of  her  great  plan.  The  prophets  long 
ago  saw  this,  but  now  science  with  cooler  breath  begins 
to  preach  it.  —  Thos.  Starr  King. 

sia- 

THE  PARABLES  of  Nature  run 
From  the  glow-worm  to  the  sun; 
There  is  no  land,  there  is  no  speech 
Nor  language,  but  her  voices  teach 
Therein  a  truth  to  every  one; 
And  multitudinous  tongues  confess 
The  marvel  of  her  fruitfulness. 

—  Chas.  Warren  StoddarcL 


420  CALIFORNIA    ANTHOLOGY. 

DEATH. 

319.  I  doubt  whether    or  not   we  should   mourn 
for  any  of  the  dead.      I  am  confident  that  there  should 
be  no  mourning  for  those  who  render  themselves  up  as 
sacrifices  in  any  great,  just  and   holy  cause.      It  better 
becomes  us  to  praise  and  dignify  them. 

—Gen.   Jas.  A.  McDougalL 

320.  Do  NOT  weep  for  me,  I  know  it's   right.      I 
wish  I  could  make  you  feel  so.     I  }wish  I  could  describe 
my  feelings.     They  are  strange!     I  feel  all  the  privileges 
and  greatness  of  the  future.     I  see  a. great  future  before 
me.      It  already  looks  grand,  beautiful.      I  am  passing 
away  fast.      My  feelings  are  strange. — Dying  words  of 
TIws.  Starr  King. 

321.  O,  DEATH!     How  bitter  are  the  memories  of 
thee!     How  sudden  thy  coming.      How  uncertain  thy 
time.      How  secret  thine  approaches.     Sometimes  thou 
knockest  at  the   door,  and  sometimes  thou  comest  in 
upannounced  and  unbidden.      Nor  does  it  grieve   thee 
much  to  come  at  the   very   moment  when   thou   canst 
most  impede  the  vain  designs  of  mortals.     Thou  keep- 
est  thy  watch  at  the  sick  man's  door,  and  thou  dost  flit 
through  chambers  lighted  by  dim  tapers.      In  an  hour, 
yea  in  a  moment,  thou  dost  scatter  the  labors  of  years. 
How  dreadful  is  thy  summons!  how  sharp  thy  trial !  how 
stern   thy  judgment !    how  summary  thine  execution ! 
And  when  thou  hast  levied  upon  thy  victim  and  stripped 
him  of  all  that  he  clung  to,  thou  dost  compel   Nature 
to  execute  to  thee  a   release!      How   universal   is  thy 
dominion.     The  powerful  cannot  resist,  the  wise  know 


MISCELLANY.  421 

not  how  to  evade  thee.  Thou  dost  cut  off  the  expecta 
tions  of  heirs,  thou  dost  break  up  the  succession  of 
kings.  With  thee  there  is  no  poverty,  neither  are 
there  any  riches  with  thee;  for  gold  cannot  purchase 
life.  Thou  art  the  sword  that  is  never  blunted,  the 
bow  before  whose  arrows  all  must  fall.  Thou  sendest 
forth  the  plague,  and  whole  kingdoms  lie  half  un 
peopled  by  thy  ravages.  Thou  Liberator  of  prisoners! 
Thou  Emancipator  of  him  that  is  in  bonds!  Thou 
takest  forth  the  precious  from  the  vile,  and  the  vile 
from  the  precious;  and  in  this  thy  mouth  is  as  the  call 
of  God.  Thou  art  the  inevitable  visitor  in  every  home. 
Thou  fillest  the  world  with  widows  and  with  orphans. 
Thou  bringest  together  the  beginning  and  the  end 
of  man's  career  with  scarce  an  inch  of  time  between. 
Luxury  is  thy  helper,  the  wine  cup  is  thine  ally. 

Under  the  painted  face  of  faded  beauty  thou  dost 
grin  and  chuckle;  for  no  counterfeit  of  youth  can  de 
ceive  thee!  and  there  thou  dost  make  thine  approaches 
confidently  and  securely. 

Flattery  courts  thee  in  vain,  and  thou  mockest  at  the 
pride  of  man.  Remorseless  monster!  Thou  art  deaf 
alike  to  the  pleading  of  friendship  and  the  plaintive  cry 
of  love.  When  Art  and  Learning  weep  at  the  early 
grave  of  genius,  thou  standest  by  with  folded  arms,  and 
leaning  against  thy  Cyprus  tree  thou  dost  smile  and  say, 
"  The  prey  is  mine."  Thou  dost  breathe  upon  the  tender 
grass  and  it  is  blasted.  Thou  drinkest  the  winds,  thou 
poisonest  the  air.  All  things  else  have  their  increase 
and  their  decline;  but  thou  O  Death!  art  forever  fixed 
and  permanent  in  thine  awful  being.  The  plumed 


422  CALIFORNIA   ANTHOLOGY. 

hearse  is  thy  chariot,  the  coffin  thy  traveling  trunk,  Ob 
livion  thine  outrider;  and  far  through  visionary  shades 
thou  dost  roam  with  ghosts,  to  view  thine  epitaphs  and 
thy  skulls.  Reticent  monarch!  Thou  makest  us  to  die; 
but  thou  dost  not  tell  us  what  it  is  to  die;  nor  dost  thou 
permit  any  to  bring  back  from  thy  gloomy  portals  the 
mighty  secrets  that  lie  beyond.  Grim  tyrant!  Thy 
carnival  is  the  battle-field;  Diseases,  Massacres,  Poison, 
Famine,  are  thy  dread  ministers.  The  whole  earth  is 
thy  cruising  ground.  All  that  slumber  in  the  sea  be 
long  to  thee.  All  that  lie  in  the  innumerable  graves  are 
thine.  And  when  they  tell  thee  of  a  Great  Deliverer 
—one  who  will  sound  a  mighty  trumpet  in  thy  realms, 
take  away  thy  keys,  open  thy  doors  and  arouse  thy 
sleepers — one  whom  thy  power  could  not  hold — one 
who  burst  thy  bars  asunder,  shook  off  thy  fetters,  and 
rising  from  the  tomb,  tauntingly  asked  thee  where  was 
thy  sting — one  who  will  gather  together  all  thy  victims 
—yea  every  atom  of  dust  which  thou  hast  embezzled 
and  hidden  away,  of  all  the  souls  which  thou  hast 
robbed  of  their  tenements  and  scattered  far  and  wide 
over  the  universe,  making  up  for  them  bodies  clothed 
with  immortality — when  they  tell  thee  all  this,  thou  dost 
laugh;  and  taking  thy  downward  flight  through  space, 
thou  standest  at  the  gates  of  Hell  and  shakest  thy 
keys! — Geo.  Barstow. 

322.  ON  MY  RETURN  to  the  island  of  Nantucket, 
after  an  eleven  years'  sojourn  in  California,  as  I  was 
rambling  among  the  familiar  scenes,  I  strolled  out  upon 
the  Mill  Hills,  and  soon  found  myself  treading  among 


MISCELLANY.  423 

the  grassy  mounds  of  the  neighboring  cemetery.  There 
I  came  upon  a  simple  shaft  bearing  this  inscription  upon 
one  of  its  sides:  "A  teacher  of  youth."  The  literature 
of  the  tombstone  deserves  far  more  of  the  critic's  anal 
ysis  and  of  philosophic  reflection  than  it  has  ever  re 
ceived.  Each  age,  each  nation,  writes  above  its  dead, 
not  only  its  sorrows,  but  its  religion,  and  the  standard 
whether  physical,  intellectual  or  moral,  by  which  it 
appreciates  greatness.  The  tomb-stone  is  a  wondrous 
tell-tale.  What  it  tells  of  the  dead,  indeed  is  almost 
valueless,  save  to  personal  friends  who  need  not  its 
record.  But  what  it  tells  of  the  living  is  invaluable  to 
after  times.  Even  the  pompous,  ill-merited  epitaph, 
and  the  quaint,  rude  couplet,  each  bears  a  secret  in  its 
core  concerning  the  living,  and  tells  it  to  those  who 
come  after.  The  language  of  the  tomb-stone  is  per 
haps  the  tersest  and  most  remarkable  of  all  literature. 
In  it  is  a  world  of  meaning.  In  the  catacombs  of  Rome, 
you  shall  read  the  inscription:  "Atrox,  O  Fortuna, 
truci  quae  funere  caudes,  quid  mihi  tarn  subito  Maxi- 
mus  eripitur." 

In  that  cry  of  the  bereaved  mother:  "O,  relentless 
fate,  who  delightest  in  cruel  death,  why  so  early  is  my 
Maximus  torn  from  me?"  you  read  all  Roman  Heathen 
ism,  hopeless  and  despairing.  Turn  to  the  other  side 
of  the  gallery  and  there  your  eye  shall  rest  upon  the 
words,  "Domiti  in  pace.  Lea  fecit."  But,  although  the 
latinity  of  such  may  shock  the  cultivated  eye  in  that 
straggling,  misspelt  scrawl,  "My  Domitius  in  peace,  Lea 
erected  this,"  you  shall  yet  read  all  Christianity  with  its 
hopes  and  consolations.  Between  those  two  epitaphs, 

29 


424  CALIFORNIA    ANTHOLOGY. 

"which  almost  jostle  each  other  in  the  catacombs,  is  the 
"wide  religious  gulf  which  separates  Caesar  and  Nero  from 
,St.  John  and  St.  Chrysostom.  To  the  eye  of  the 
modern  wayfarer,  perchance,  as  he  leans  against  some 
cemetery  fence,  a  stone  will  present  itself  bearing  only 
the  words,  "Our  little  Kate."  How  short  in  phrase, 
but  how  multiplex  in  suggestion.  Whose  little  Kate? 
No  matter.  It  is  enough  that  they  know.  But  bound 
up  in  those  three  sweet  words  is  the  record  of  all  her 
prattling  childhood,  with  its  merry  romps  and  ringing 
laugh ;  they  tell  the  pondering  wayfarer  of  the  staircase 
where  she  trod,  of  the  chamber  where  she  slept,  of  the 
days  and  nights  of  her  sickness,  of  the  alternating  fears 
and  hopes,  of  the  funeral,  and  then  afterwards  of  the 
playthings  and  the  little  folded  dresses  and  the  desolate 
room  that  break  the  very  heart — all  the  sweet  memories 
written  out  in  those  three  short  words,  "  Our  little 
Kate."  Ah!  the  white  leaves  with  which  the  hand  of 
affliction  has  strewn  our  cemeteries  contain  a  marvel  of 
thought  and  suggestion. — Rev.  F.  C.  Ewer. 

323.- 

O,  DEATH!     Mysterious  power! 

Thou  stern  apostle  in  whose  presence  dread 

My  soul  hath  cowered  like  a  frightened  child- — 

Do  I  behold  thee  now,  at  last,  aright? 

Lo,  on  thy  brow  the  stamp  of  majesty 

Now  seems  impressed;  and  from  thy  sunken  eye 

There  gleams  perennial  promise  for  our  race, 

While  inspiration  burns  thy  hollow  cheek! 


MISCELLANY.  425 

Thou  art  God's  minister, 
And  dost  but  execute  His  sovereign  will. 
Thou  canst  not  then  be  evil;  and  thou  dost 
Deserve,  as  little  as  thou  heedest,  human  hate. 
Thy  mission  is,  to  sap  colossal  pride, 
To  turn  us  from  our  butterfly  pursuits, 
To  teach  us  what  we  are1,  and  how  to  live 
Both  here  and  in  a  world  where  thou  art  not 

Sweet  thought  that  strengthens  Faith!— 
That  harbinger  of  immortality, 
Of  tireless  and  illimitable  flight! 
Soaring  with  golden  plumes  and  speaking  eye 
Above  the  weeping  willows  of  the  heart — 
'Tis  thine  to  point  the  jaded  soul  to  God, 
And  lift  it  up  on  thy  triumphant  wings 
Into  the  radiant  realm  of  perfect  Day! 

— Oscar  T.  Shuck. 

324. ON  A  PRESSED  FLOWER. 

A  simple,  little  flower, 
Born  of  the  sun  and  shower, 
Unfolded  slowly; 

Poor  blossom!  but  to  lie 
So  colorless  and  dry — 
Forgotten  wholly. 

— G.  C.  Hurlbut. 

A  FAREWELL  TO  SYRIA. 

325.      It  was  upon  a  bright  and   sunny  afternoon 
that  we  loaded  our  trunks  and  carpet-bags   upon  the 


426  CALIFORNIA   ANTHOLOGY. 

backs  of  a  dozen  lusty  Beirutan  porters  and  followed 
them  down  to  the  custom-house  of  that  city.  The 
Archduchess  Carlotta,  the  same  steamer  in  which,  a 
month  before,  we  had  left  Alexandria  for  Syria,  lay 
rolling  gently  in  the  waves  of  St.  George's  Bay,  only 
waiting  for  our  little  party  to  sail  away  from  Cyprus.  In 
half  an  hour  we  had  got  through  with  the  last  of  Syrian 
officials,  public  and  private,  and  were  standing  upon  the 
quarter-deck  of  the  little  Austrian  steamer,  stancher 
and  sounder,  we  hoped,  than  her  unfortunate  patron  at 
Miramar.  Beyrout  had  never  seemed  so  lovely;  her 
harbor  so  graceful,  her  shores  so  invicing,  as  at  this, 
the  moment  we  were  to  take  leave  of  them  forever.  It 
seemed  as  if  old  Lebanon  himself  leaned  over  toward 
the  pure  waters  of  the  bay,  almost  nodding  his  snow- 
crested  head  in  final  adieu,  while  the  mulberry  groves 
upon  his  venerable  sides  gently  waved  their  dark  green 
foliage,  as  if  in  solemn  warning  to  us  that  we  should 
look  upon  their  beauties  no  more.  It  is  a  sad  thing  to 
feel  that  you  are  looking  for  the  last  time  upon  any 
material  object.  The  dying  man  bids  his  attendant 
raise  him  up  and  to  open  the  window.  "  Let  me  look  out 
once  more  at  the  glorious  sun,  the  green  fields,  and  the 
running  brook,  for  I  shall  see  them  no  more.  Now* 
lay  me  down  and  shut  the  window."  It  is  done,  and  he 
sails  away.  We  are  all  either  dying  men  or  dying 
women,  or  are  children  who  have  come  into  this  beau 
tiful  world  with  the  seed  of  disease  which  carries  us 
away  from  the  bright  landscape,  the  beautiful  bay,  or 
the  lofty  mountain,  and  which  is  sure  to  shut  the  win 
dow  upon  us,  in  a  few  brief  days  or  years  at  the  most. 


MISCELLANY.  427 

Farewell,  Syria!  Thy  mountains  and  streams,  thy 
beautiful  cities  and  pleasant  groves;  the  land  of  Abra 
ham,  of  Isaac  and  of  Jacob — the  birthplace  of  the  wor 
ship  of  the  living  God,  where  Christ  lived  and  died  for 
man-kind — a  long  farewell! 

A  tremor  passes  through  the  bones  of  the  Archduch 
ess,  a  splashing  is  heard  over  the  side,  the  pure  waters 
are  cloven  asunder  at  the  prow,  and  pass  away  in  foam 
at  the  stern.  The  huge  mountain  straightens  up  in  his 
seat  and  sinks  back  into  the  fading  horizon ;  the  groves 
of  mulberry  cease  waving  their  adieus,  and  retire.  They 
are  shutting  the  window. — John  F.  Swift. 

326. ON   RECROSSING  THE  ROCKY  MOUNTAINS  AFTER 

MANY  YEARS. 

Long  years  ago  I  wandered  here 
In  the  mid-Summer  of  the  year — 

Life's  Summer  too; 
A  score  of  horsemen  here  we  rode, 
The  mountain  world  its  glories  showed, 

All  fair  to  view. 

These  scenes  in  glowing  colors  drest, 
Mirrored  the  life  within  my  breast, 

Its  world  of  hope; 

The  whispering  woods  and  fragrant  breeze 
That  stirred  the  grass  in  verdant  seas 

On  billowy  slope; 

And  glistening  crag  in  sunlit  sky, 
Mid  snowy  clouds  piled  mountain  high, 
Were  joys  tome; 


CALIFORNIA   ANTHOLOGY. 

My  path  was  o'er  the  praries  wide, 
Or  here  on  grander  mountain-side, 
To  choose,  all  free. 

The  rose  that  waved  in  morning  air, 
And  spread  its  dewy  fragrance  there 

In  careless  bloom, 
Gave  to  my  heart  its  ruddiest  hue, 
O'er  my  glad  life  its  colors  threw 

And  sweet  perfume. 

Now  changed  the  scene  and  changed  the  eyes 
That  here  once  looked  on  glowing  skies, 

Where  Summer  smiled; 
These  riven  trees  and  wind-swept  plain 
Now  show  the  Winter's  dread  domain, 

Its  fury  wild. 

The  rocks  rise  black  from  storm-packed  snow, 
All  checked  the  river's  pleasant  flow, 

Vanished  the  bloom; 
These  dreary  wastes  of  frozen  plain 
Reflect  my  bosom's  life  again, 

Now  lonesome  gloom. 

The  buoyant  hopes  and  busy  life 
Have  ended  all  in  hateful  strife, 

And  thwarted  aim. 

The  world's  rude  contact  killed  the  rose, 
No  more  its  radiant  color  shows 

False  roads  to  fame. 

Backward,  amidst  the  twilight  glow 
Some  lingering  spots  yet  brightly  show 


MISCELLANY.  429 

On  hard  roads  won, 

Where  still  some  grand  peaks  mark  the  way 
Touched  by  the  light  of  parting  day 

And  memory's  sun. 

But  here  thick  clouds  the  mountains  hide, 
The  dim  horizon  bleak  and  wide 

No  pathway  shows, 
And  rising  gusts  and  darkening  sky 
Tell  of  "the  night  that  cometh"  nigh, 

The  brief  day's  close. 

—Gen.  John  C.  Fremont* 


THE  COMET  OF  1858. 

327.  If  to-night,  you  will  look  out  from  the  glare 
of  your  illuminated  city  into  the  northwestern  heavens, 
you  will  perceive,  low  down  on  the  edge  of  the  horizon, 
a  bright  stranger  pursuing  its  path  across  the  sky. 
[Atlantic  Cable  Oration,  San  Francisco,  September  27, 
1858. — EDITOR.]  Amid  the  starry  hosts  that  keep  their 
watch,  it  shines,  attended  by  a  brighter  pomp  and  followed 
by  a  broader  train.  No  living  man  has  gazed  upon  its 
splendors  before.  No  watchful  votary  of  science  has 
traced  its  course  for  nearly  ten  generations.  It  is  more 
than  three  hundred  years  since  its  approach  was  visible 
from  our  planet.  When  last  it  came  it  startled  an 
Emperor  on  his  throne;  and  while  the  superstition  of 
his  age  taught  him  to  perceive  in  its  presence  a  herald 
and  a  doom,  his  pride  saw  in  its  flaming  course  and 


430  CALIFORNIA   ANTHOLOGY. 

fiery  train,  the  announcement  that  his  own  light  was 
about  to  be  extinguished.  In  common  with  the  lowest 
of  his  subjects,  he  read  omens  of  destruction  in  the 
baleful  heavens,  and  prepared  himself  for  a  fate  which 
alike  awaits  the  mightiest  and  the  meanest.  Thanks  to 
the  present  condition  of  scientific  knowledge  we  read 
the  heavens  with  a  far  clearer  perception.  We  see  in 
the  predicted  return  of  the  rushing,  blazing  comet 
through  the  sky,  the  march  of  a  heavenly  messenger 
along  its  appointed  way  and  around  its  predestined 
orbit.  For  three  hundred  years  he  has  traveled  amid 
the  regions  of  infinite  space.  "Lone,  wandering,  but 
not  lost,"  he  has  left  behind  him  shining  suns,  blazing 
stars,  and  gleaming  constellations,  now  nearer  the  eter 
nal  throne,  and  again  on  the  confines  of  the  universe. 
He  returns  with  visage  radiant  and  benign;  he  returns 
with  unimpeded  march  and  unobstructed  way ;  he  re 
turns,  the  majestic,  swift,  electric  telegraph  of  the 
Almighty,  bearing  upon  his  flaming  front  the  tidings 
that  throughout  the  universe  there  is  still  peace  and 
order;  that,  amid  the  immeasurable  dominions  of  the 
Great  King,  His  rule  is  still  perfect;  that  suns  and 
stars  and  systems  tread  their  endless  circle  and  obey 
the  eternal  law. — Gen.  E.  D.  Baker. 


THE  MIST. 
328.- 

I  watched  the  folding  of  a  soft,  white- wing 

Above  the  city's  heart— 
I  saw  the  mist  its  silfcnt  shadow  fling 


MISCELLANY.  431 

O'er  thronged  and  busy  marc — 
Softly  it  glided  through  the  Golden  Gate, 

And  up  the  shining  Bay- 
Calmly  it  lingered  on  the  hills  to  wait 

The  dying  of  the  day. 
Like  the  white  ashes  of  the  sunset  fire 

It  lay  within  the  West, 
Then  onward  crept,  above  the  lofty  spire 

In  nimbus- wreaths  to  rest. 
It  spread  anon — its  fleecy  clouds  unrolled 

And  floated  gently  down. 
And  thus  I  saw  that  silent  wmg  enfold 

The  Babel-throated  town. 
A  spell  was  laid  on  restless  strife  and  din, 

That  bade  its  tumult  cease— 
A  veil  was  flung  o'er  squalor,  woe,  and  sin. 

Of  purity  and  peace; 
And  dreaming  hearts,  so  hallowed  by  the  mist, 

So  freed  from  grosser  leaven, 
In  the  soft  chime  of  vesper-bells  could  list 

Sweet,  echoed  tones  of  Heaven; 
Could  see,  enraptured,  when  the  starlight  came, 

With  lustre  soft  and  pale, 
A  sacred  city,  crowned  with  "ring  of  flame," 

Beneath  her  misty  veil. 

-Miss  H.  M.  $kidmore. 

THE  NORTH  WIND. 
329.- 

All  night,  beneath  the  flashing  hosts  of  stars, 
The  North  poured  forth  the  passion  of  its  soul 


432  CALIFORNIA    ANTHOLOGY. 

In  mighty  longings  for  the  tawny  South, 
Sleeping  afar  among  her  orange-blossoms. 
All  night,  through  the  deep  canyon's  organ-pipes, 
Swept  down  the  grand  orchestral  harmonies 
Tumultuous,  till  the  hills's  rock  buttresses 
Trembled  in  unison. 

The  sun  has  risen, 

But  still  the  storming  sea  of  air  beats  on, 
And  o'er  the  broad  green  slopes  a  flood  of  light 
Comes  streaming  through  the  heavens  like  wind, 
Till  every  leaf  and  twig  becomes  a  lyre, 
And  thrills  with  vibrant  splendor. 

Down  the  bay 

The  furrowed  blue,  save  that  'tis  starred  with  foam. 
Is  bare  and  empty  as  the  sky  of  clouds; 
For  all  the  little  sails,  that  yesterday 
Flocked  past  the  islands,  now  have  furled  their  wings, 
And  huddle  frightened  at  the  wharves — just  as, 
A  moment  since,  a  flock  of  twittering  birds 
Whirled  through  the  almond  trees  like  scattered  leaves, 
And  hid  beyond  the  hedge. 

How  the  old  oaks 

Stand  stiffly  to  it,  and  wrestle  with  the  storm! 
While  the  tall  eucalyptus'  plumy  tops 
Tumble  and  toss  and  stream  with  quivering  light. 
Hark!  when  it  lulls  a  moment  on  the  ear. 
The  fir-trees  sing  their  sea-song—  now  again 
The  roar  is  all  about  us  like  a  flood; 
And  like  a  flood  the  fierce  light  shines,  and  burns 
Away  all  distance,  till  the  far  blue  ridge, 


MISCELLANY.  433 

That  rims  the  ocean,  rises  close  at  hand, 
And  high,  Prometheus-like,  great  Tamalpais 
Lifts  proudly  his  grand  front,  and  bears  his  scar, 
Heaven's  scathe  of  wrath,  defiant  like  a  god. 

I  thank  thee,  glorious  wind!     Thou  bringest  me 
Something  that  breathes  of  mountain  crags  and  pines; 
Yea,  more — from  the  unsullied,  farthest  North, 
Where  crashing  icebergs  jar  like  thunder-shocks, 
And  midnight  splendors  wave  and  fade  and  flame, 
Thou  bring'st  a  keen,  fierce  joy.     So  wilt  thou  help 
The  soul  to  rise  in  strength,  as  some  great  wave 
Leaps  forth,  and  shouts,  and  lifts  the  ocean-foam, 
And  rides  exultant  round  the  shining  world. 

—E.  R.  Sill. 


WOMAN. 

330.  William  H.   Seward,  upon  his   return   from 
his  journey  round  the  world,   said,    "There  are,   in  all 
the  East,  no  homes."     WThat  a  commentary  upon   the 
state  of  society  in  the  oldest  lands!      No   homes!      Be 
cause  woman   is  degraded  and  enslaved.      No  homes! 
Because  both  religions  and  governments  studiously  and 
systematically  keep  mothers  and  daughters  in  the  dark 
ness  of  ignorance. — Rev.   W.  E.  Ijams. 

331.  MANY  A  WOMAN  who,  as  a  belle,  was  a  trium 
phant  success,  as  a  wife  and  mother  is  a  pitiable  failure. 
Her  nominal  value  is  what  she  passes  for  on  the  prome 
nade  ;  but  her  intrinsic  worth  is  measured  by  the  beauty 


434  CALIFORNIA    ANTHOLOGY. 

and  excellence  of  her  home-life — by  what  she  adds  to 
the  wealth  and  glory  of  humanity.  The  mere  act  of 
accepting  wifehcod  should  be  equivalent  to  the  most 
solemn  vows;  and  no  wife  can  hope  to  preserve  full 
empire  over  the  heart  of  a  true  husband  whose  desires 
and  longings  are  forever  reaching  outside  the  blessed 
atmosphere  of  home;  who  does  not  possess,  in  some 
measure,  a  character  the  keystone  of  which  is  that 
whereon  motherhood  has  its  foundation — self-sacrifice. 
Happy  the  man,  whatever  his  ungracious  fortune,  who, 
amid  the  fretting  and  distracting  din  of  the  wearisome 
day,  is  forever  catching  the  echoes  of  home-harmonies, 
awaiting  him  just  a  little  ahead,  in  the  twilight.  Such 
melodies  are  never  voiced  by  women  who  forsake  the 
pole-star  of  duty  that  they  may  chase  the  ignis-fatuus 
of  Pleasure. — Sarah  B.  Cooper. 

332.  THE  HISTORY  of  civilization,  nay  of  Christ 
ianity,  has  been  marked  by  the  removing,  one  after 
another,  of  the  shackles  which  an  early  and  dark,  not 
to  say  a  savage  period  of  our  race,  heaped  upon  woman. 
And  if  there  be  a  fact  as  certain  as  that  when  the  faint 
streaks  of  dawn  mark  the  East  the  day  is  about  to 
break,  it  is  the  fact  that  this  great  nation  will  sooner  or 
later  rise  and  lift  woman  to  the  double  throne  (not,  in 
deed  of  art  and  literature,  for  she  sits  there  now)  but 
of  science,  of  philosophy,  of  oratory,  of  religion,  and  of 
politics.  The  subjects  presented  by  Providence  for 
man's  investigation  and  knowledge  are  many-sided. 
The  angle  at  which  woman  looks  upon  subjects  is  differ 
ent  from  the  angle  at  whicn  they  appear  to  the  vision 


MISCELLANY.  435 

of  man.  For  a  complete  knowledge,  therefore,  in  the 
realms  of  science,  philosophy,  religion,  politics,  which 
man  alone  cannot  attain  to,  fixed  as  he  is  by  heaven  at 
the  masculine  angle  of  vision,  man  needs,  and  will 
eventually  demand  and  have  the  indispensable  and  un 
shackled  aid  of  woman.  Woman  is  the  purifying 
element  of  our  social  life. — Rev.  F.  C.  Ewer. 

333.  MORE  THAN  railroads  and  telegraphs,  more 
than  the  subtile  connections  of  commerce  and  literature, 
woman  is  spinning  the  delicate  threads  that  are  to  bind 
the  English-speaking  people  together  and  blend  their 
hearts  in  sympathy  and  love.  Duty,  not  glory,  is  the 
corner-stone  of  the  Anglo-Saxon  creed,  and  from  the 
homes  in  three  continents  which  rest  on  this  foundation, 
rises  the  arch  of  promise  which  spans  alike  the  stormy 
and  the  peaceful  sea,  and  braids  into  bright  and  uplifted 
characters  the  noblest  hopes  of  mankind.  And  if, 
amidst  the  teeming  civilization  of  the  present  day,  when 
in  a  thousand  organized  forms,  the  strength  of  low 
ambition  and  unscrupulous  wealth  is  felt,  liberty  and 
virtue  are  not  to  be  parted;  if  statesmen  are  to  rise 
above  the  mists  and  obscurities  of  a  narrow  patriotism 
or  a  passionate  revenge  to  the  serene  hights  of  wisdom 
and  honor;  if  peace  is  to  shed  over  all  distracted  lands 
its  mild  light  and  its  perfumed  warmth ;  if  religion  is  to 
cleanse  its  garments  of  dogmatism  and  intolerance,  and 
walk  among  men  in  the  "beauty  of  holiness;"  to  the 
moulding  influence  of  woman,  more  than  to  all  other 
earthly  causes,  will  these  mighty  results  be  due.  In 
woman,  in  the  perfection  of  her  attributes  and  of  her 


436  CALIFORNIA   ANTHOLOGY. 

power,  imagination  and  fact  are  but  the  faithful  reflec 
tions  of  each  other.  The  earnest  Ruth,  gleaning  in 
the  fields  of  Boaz ;  Mary,  dropping  repentant  tears 
upon  the  Master's  feet;  Priscilla,  exhibiting  to  the  red 
Savages  the  stern  beauty  of  a  Puritan  enthusiast;  the 
lovelorn  Evangeline,  listening  to  the  mysterious  under 
tone  of  the  trackless  ocean;  the  twin  sisters  of  mercy 
in  England  and  America,  soothing  pain  and  anguish  in 
prisons  and  hospitals  and  asylums,  and  even  on  the 
tented  field,  awakening  contrition  in  the  heart  of  guilt, 
and  lifting  the  black  curtain  between  despair  and  peace 
— all  these  are  types  and  illustrations  of  character  which 
shall  form  the  loftiest  themes  of  poetry  and  song,  till 
the  records  of  time  shall  close.  No  marvel  that  to 
man — furrowed  and  hardened  by  the  toil  and  the  pain 
of  life — down  through  the  weary  years,  floats  the  sweet 
music  of  a  woman's  voice,  returns  the  dewy  brightness 
of  her  glance,  and  charms  away  selfishness  and  vice. 
No  marvel  that  the  dying  soldier  kisses  a  woman's 
shadow  on  his  pillow.  No  marvel  that  our  holiest 
feelings  stir  as,  with  one  mind  and  one  heart,  we  give 
our  highest  honors  to  the  name  of  woman. — Henry  £. 
Highton. 

334.  THERE  is  a  great  amount  of  genuine  satis 
faction  in  freely  acknowledging  the  real  empire  which 
woman  holds  over  our  hearts  and  minds,  our  thoughts 
and  actions,  our  motives,  hopes  and  ambitions,  and  (I 
may  add,  I  trust,  without  offense)  our  pockets.  None 
of  us,  I  think,  will  deny  her  right  to  love  us  and  be 
loved  in  return,  (indeed  we  take  no  small  delight  in 


MISCELLANY.  437 

having  her  exercise  that  prerogative  in  our  individual 
cases) — or  her  right  to  wheedle  and  caress  us,  and  to 
draw  as  well  upon  our  affections  as  upon  our  bank 
accounts;  to  be  sheltered  and  protected  by  us,  and  yet, 
in  her  own  insidious,  charming  way,  to,  rule  and  govern 
us  just  as  autocratically  as  she  pleases,  as  long  as  she 
sways  the  scepter  of  a  true  woman,  and  does  not  so  far 
forget  herself  as  to  become  transformed  into  a  sort  of 
moral  hybrid,  with  a  perverted  ambition  to  enter  upon 
the  hard,  and  to  her,  degrading  duties  of  man's  sphere 
(for  which  her  tender  and  susceptible  nature  so  entirely 
unfits  her,)  impatient  of  wearing  the  modest  but  capti 
vating  drapery,  both  of  mind  and  person,  that  are 
native  to  her;  for  she  is  as  misplaced  in  the  more  mas 
culine  habits  and  attire  as  would  be  the  Capitoline 
Venus  in  the  heavy  armor  of  Achilles.  There  are 
servitudes  more  delightful  than  the  wielding  of  power; 
and  the  homage  we  pay  to  the  soft  sway  of  woman, 
which  finds  its  strength  in  her  very  weakness,  is  one  of 
these.  It  is  a  delight  to  serve,  when  that  service  is,  as 
we  flatter  ourselves,  a  protection. 

The  great  mastiff  is  gentle  and  obedient  to  the  con 
trol  of  a  child,  and  the  strongest  man  is  easily  con 
quered  and  taken  captive  by  the  charming  little  ways 
of  the  weakest  woman.  But  she  must  be  a  woman, 
v  Herein  lies  the  singular  power  and  sway  of  that  great 
and  noble,  sovereign,  the  anniversary  of  whose  natal 
day  we  celebrate.  [Queen  Victoria — EDITOR.]  We 
delight  to  honor  her.  We  yield  her  spontaneous  re 
spect  through  the  compelling  power  of  her  womanly  vir 
tues.  We  yield  the  same  obedience,  the  same  love,  the 


438  CALIFORNIA   ANTHOLOGY. 

same  respect  to  every  true  woman.  Our  hearts  turn 
toward  them  for  sympathy  and  encouragement  in  our 
griefs  and  trials,  for  a  shared,  and  thereby  increased  joy 
in  our  success,  for  those  high  impulses  and  truer  aspira 
tions,  which  her  purer  and  more  delicately  organized 
nature  can  alone  afford  us,  and  which  have  power  to 
save  us,  from  utter  submersion  in  the  sordid  cares  and 
bitter  struggles  of  every-day  life. 

"O,  woman!  lovely  woman  !  nature  made  you 
To  temper  man ;  we  had  been  brutes  without  you. 
Angels  are  painted  fair  to  look  like  you. 
There's  in  you  all  that  we  believe  of  heaven — 
Amazing  brightness,  purity  and  truth, 
Eternal  joy,  and  everlasting  love." 

—  William  Hayes. 


33S.      DELILAH.- 

[On  seeing  Mr.  Story's  beautiful  Statue,  the  property  of  Mrs.  Shillaber,  of  San  Francisco.] 

I  see  thy  traitor  face,  thy  dimpled  arms, 

Thy  downcast  head  and  snowy  bosom's  charms, 

Fair  false  Philistine  maid. 
And  the  cold  marble  seems  to  throb  and  glow 
With  life's  hot  blood,  the  pulse  to  come  and  go 

Along  each  chisel'd  vein. 

I  hear  thee  say,  "Come  sleep  upon  my  knees, 
My  lion-hearted  Nazarite — take  thine  ease; 

My  love  shall  guard  thee  well. 
I  fain  would  sing  to  thee  a  Sorek  air, 
And  comb  the  tangles  of  thy  tawny  hair — 

My  Samson,  rest  thee  here." 


MISCELLANY.  439 

"Thy  strength  a  thousand  men  could  not  withstand, 
Nor  Gaza's  brazen  gates  thy  God-like  hand; 

Whence  cometh  it,  my  love?" 
I  see  thee  stoop  to  kiss  his  drowsy  brow 
And  bend  thee  low  to  catch  his  secret,  now 

I  see  thy  false,  false  smile. 

Call  in  thy  people,  let  them  shout  for  joy, 
For  at  thy  feet  lies  all  his  Strength :  a  boy — 

A  child  may  bind  him  now. 

Aye  draw  thy  mantle — hang  thy  head  for  Shame, 
Clutch  tight  thy  gold  and  bear  a  wanton's  name, 

Fair,  frail  Philistine  girl. 

— Charles  F.   Craddock. 


THE  IRISH  RACE. 

336.  History  tells  us  that  nations  are  subject  to 
the  universal  law  of  decay.  The  shores  of  time  are 
strewed  with  the  wrecks  of  empires.  Not  only  does 
the  outward  structure  of  government  disappear,  but  the 
living  pillars  of  the  edifice — the  people — fall,  never  to 
rise  again.  Some  kingdoms  perish  through  inherent 
weakness,  others  from  conflict  with  a  stronger  power. 
When  an  exception  to  this  apparently  unrelenting  law 
is  found;  when  an  ancient  nation  presents  itself  which 
has  never  felt  the  breath  of  decay,  but  exhibits  the 
same  vitality,  energy,  and  power  that  it  displayed  cen 
turies  ago,  it  is  a  cause  of  astonishment  to  the  historian 
and  of  delight  to  him  who  can  call  such  a  nation  his 

30 


440  CALIFORNIA   ANTHOLOGY. 

own.  It  has  been  said  that  the  greatness  of  a  country 
may  be  traced  in  the  monuments  of  past  ages.  Is  it  not 
wonderful  to  behold  a  race  which  refuses  to  be  judged 
by  its  architectural  wonders  alone,  but  raising  aloft  its 
voice,  exclaims :  "  Study  not  the  inscription  on  my 
ruins.  Behold  me  in  the  bloom  of  youth;  the  glow 
of  health  is  on  my  cheek,  the  sparkle  in  my  eye.  I  am 
not  aged  though  my  name  is  found  among  the  oldest 
nations  of  the  earth.  In  years  gone  by  I  ranked  with 
the  first;  but  fate  robbed  me  of  my  high  position,  and 
abandoned  me  to  my  conquerors.  Crushed  under  the 
heel  of  oppression  my  body  was  apparently  dead,  but 
my  spirit,  the  spirit  of  nationality  lived,  and  now  lives, 
to  cheer,  to  animate,  to  enrapture  my  children's  hearts." 

What  must  constitute  a  nation  ?  There  must  be 
something  that  lies  deeper  than  the  mere  form  of 
government.  This  alone  cannot  suffice.  God  forbid 
that  it  should.  No!  a  national  soul  must  exist.  The 
race  must  have  a  history,  genius,  character. 

Have  the  Irish  genius? — that  wondrous  power  which, 
disdaining  the  limit  of  cold  words,  seeks  the  magnetism 
of  hearts — which,  led  by  science,  has  swept  along  the 
silvery  stars  and  outshone  the  fiery  meteor  in  brilliancy 
—which  has  filled  nations  with  an  ardent  desire  to  gaze 
on  Freedom's  face  and  receive  from  her  divine  hands 
the  charters  of  their  liberties — which  gives  to  art  its 
inspiration,  to  poetry  its  feeling,  to  eloquence  its  fire,  to 
war  its  dazzling  radiance — which,  springing  from  the 
head  of  the  Omnipotent,  partaking  of  His  glory,  gilds 
with  its  golden  beams  the  universe  and  knows  no  limit 


MISCELLANY.  441 

but  eternity.  Yes!  the  Irish  have  been  blessed  with 
this  wondrous  gift. 

Whether  it  sparkles  forth  in  the  bright  wit  that  all 
the  people  of  that  race  possess;  or  it  be  shown  in  the 
achievements  of  the  great  and  glorious  past  by  its  bards, 
its  brehons,  its  warriors,  or  its  saints;  or  in  modern 
times  by  a  Burke,  leading  the  van  in  statesmanship,  or 
by  a  Sheridan,  pleading  the  cause  of  an  oppressed 
nation  with  sublime  eloquence,  and  astonishing  the 
world  by  his  varied  powers,  or  by  a  Grattan  in  the  Sen 
ate,  or  by  a  Curran  at  the  bar,  pouring  forth  in  burning 
words  Erin's  protest  against  tyranny ;  or  by  a  Gold 
smith,  a  Moore,  a  Davis,  a  McCarthy,  touching  the 
heart  by  their  poetry  and  crowning  their  own  Green 
Isle  with  the  laurels  of  song;  or  by  a  Barry,  a  Maclise, 
a  Hogan,  a  Foley,  drawing  down  the  fire  of  Heaven, 
and  imparting  the  breath  of  life  to  the  canvas,  marble, 
or  bronze;  or  by  a  Balfe,  a  Wallace,  bringing  back  the 
clustering  memories  of  the  bards  of  old  by  their  musical 
skill — the  verdict  of  the  admiring  world  is  and  will  be 
that  wherever,  and  in  whatever  capacity  they  are  found, 
the  children  of  Erin  are  the  children  of  Genius. 

The  three  great  features  of  Irish  character  are 
religious  enthusiasm,  love  of  country,  and  lightness  of 
heart.  In  the  gloom  of  the  past  this  trinity  of  qualities 
supported  the  heroic  people  through  the  most  blood 
curdling  tyranny  that  the  pen  of  history  has  ever  re 
corded.  Confiscation  robbed  them  of  their  land  in  the 
name  of  justice,  penal  statutes  struck  at  their  conscience 
and  their  liberty  in  the  name  of  law;  gaunt  famine 
preyed  upon  their  hearts  in  the  guise  of  political  econ- 


442  CALIFORNIA   ANTHOLOGY. 

omy.  All  these  horrors  were  born  of  British  hate  and 
British  rule.  But  suffering  could  not  deprive  the  Irish 
people  of  their  noble  attributes.  Three  hundred  years  of 
continued  persecution  have  failed  to  shake  their  faith  in 
the  creed  that  Patrick  gave  them.  That  religion  still 
remains  as  the  record  of  their  endurance,  and  the  ada 
mant  of  their  hopes.  It  is  more  august,  more  inspiring, 
loftier,  and  more  thrilling  in  its  memories  than  any 
monument  of  antiquity,  for  its  foundation  is  divine  and 
its  superstructure  is  cemented  by  a  people's  blood. 

—Francis  J.  Sullivan. 


337.     CHRISTMAS— 
O,  winds  that  blow 
From  palmy  isles,  or  realms  of  snow, 

Be  still! 

O,  waves  that  roll, 
In  majesty  from  pole  to  pole, 

Be  still! 

O  sea,  no  more 
With  vain  complaining  vex  the  shore; 

Be  still! 

Peace,  peace  to  winds,  and  waves  and  sea, 
God's  peace  for  all  eternity! 

Lo!  wise  men  bring 

From  the  rich  East  their  offering 

To  Judah's  king! 
And  at  his  feet, 
With  precious  gifts  and  odors  sweet, 

Fall  worshipping. 


MISCELLANY.  443 

O,  stars  that  gleam 

From  bending  skies,  on  Jordan's  stream, 

Together  sing- 
Peace,  peace,  God's  peace  on  land  and  sea, 
Good  will  to  men  eternally  ! 

Chas.  F.  Craddock. 


GENIUS. 

338.  How  often  do  we  find  all  the  conditions  of 
good  writing  fulfilled,  yet  the  net  result,  weakness. 
The  beam  of  sunlight  has,  besides  the  seven  rays  into 
which  the  prism  untwists  it,  another,  the  actinic  ray, 
the  very  soul  of  the  beam,  which  glides  unbent  through 
the  prism.  Something  more  than  the  bare  truth  is 
needed  to  make  words  impressive;  there  must  be  the 
vivifying  vigor  shed  into  them  from  the  man  behind. 
It  is  not  enough  to  have  truth  stored  in  the  reservoirs 
of  memory,  where  it  can  be  pumped  out  for  occasion. 
It  must  come  first-hand  from  the  soul,  or  it  is  power 
less.  Substances,  when  burned,  develop  just  so  much 
heat  as  is  latent  in  them — just  so  much  as  they  sucked 
from  the  sun  at  their  creation.  So  the  opinions  and 
sentiments  of  different  men  exert  force  according  to 
the  degree  in  which  they  have  been  organized  into  their 
natures.  Is  there  anything  more  dreary  than  to  hear 
truth  chattered  to  us,  spirted  out  from  behind  the  teeth 
of  persons  who  do  not  possess  it?  In  many,  truth  lies 
like  the  candle  in  the  boy's  pumpkin-lantern  on  autumn 
evenings.  When  an  idea  gets  into  their  head,  they 


444  CALIFORNIA   ANTHOLOGY. 

pumpkin-lanternize  it,  and  make  the  truth,  like  them 
selves,  a  bore.  The  secret  of  eloquence  is  to  be  found 
in  this  vitalizing  power,  and  the  same  language  uttered 
by  men  who  believe  and  feel  what  they  are  saying,  and 
by  men  who  do  not  feel  it,  differs  as  a  tree  pictured  in 
mosaic  does  from  a  tree  that  has  grown.  It  was  not  so 
much  the  clearness  of  Webster's  thoughts  as  the  pon 
derous  substance  and  swing  of  his  whole  constitution 
that  made  his  words  come  down  like  trip-hammers. 
When  he  said,  "There  is  Lexington,  there  is  Concord, 
there  is  Bunker  Hill,"  it  was  not  the  simple  words  that 
made  them  memorable,  but  that  his  hearers  felt  there 
was  a  storm  of  feeling  entangled  and  swept  down  with 
them.  The  great  thing  is,  not  to  get  strong  things 
said,  but  to  get  the  man  big  enough  to  say  them.  The 
same  sentence  uttered  by  one  man  is  a  mere  wreath  of 
breath — by  another,  a  hurricane.  Notes  of  hand  are 
as  easily  and  as  prettily  written  by  a  pauper  as  by  a 
Crcesus,  but  their  power  to  draw  the  bullion  depends 
very  much  on  the  name  you  get  subscribed. 

—  Titos.  Starr  King. 

339.  THE  SUPPLY  of  genius  is  all  ordered  by  an 
immutable  law.  WThat  have  all  our  Presidents  since 
Washington  done,  compared  with  the  man  who  first 
organized  .the  possibility  of  a  telegraph  ? — with  him 
who  devised  the  cotton-gin  ? — with  him  who  saw  in 
imagination  the  steamships  wrestling  with  the  Atlantic, 
and  who  demonstrated  that  his  vision  could  be  copied 
into  actual  steam  and  steel  ?  What  a  land  ours  would 
be  if  our  will  and  our  votes  could  as  wisely  and  as 


MISCELLANY.  445 

surely  move  the  right  men  into  the  right  places,  as 
nature  provides  for  the  succession  in  the  hierarchy  of 
science — as  she  orders  the  great  thinkers  to  go  to  their 
own  places,  though  so  \videly  apart  in  the  crowds  of 
common  men — Moses  to  his  post  when  the  Prince  of 
legislators  was  wanted,  Washington  to  his  when  so 
much  patriotism  and  prudence  and  commanding  ability 
were  in  demand !  The  rule  is  inflexible  that  every 
century  will  produce  its  two  or  three  great  thinkers. 
Society  is  cared  for  by  a  power  that  will  not  leave  civili 
zation  to  be  wasted,  nor  the  rivers  of  our  better  life  to 
stagnate. — T/ios.  Starr  King. 


OVER  THE  HILL. 

34O.— 

I. 

MARGUERITE    (musing.) 

Three  times  over,  four-leafed  clover 
Promised  me  a  noble  lover; 
Daisy-leaf  and  apple-seed 
With  the  oracle  agreed; 
And  the  omen  did  not  alter, 
Tested  by  the  holy  psalter. 
Will  he  come  from  East  or  West? 
Will  he  know  and  love  me  best, 
Though  I  wear  a  homespun  gown, 
And  my  hands  be  rough  and  brown? 
Will  he  see  that  I  am  not 


446  CALIFORNIA   ANTHOLOGY. 

Suited  to  this  humble  lot, 
But  have  loveliness  to  grace 
Anywhere  a  lady's  place  ? 

Golden  bees  and  butterflies 
Ranging  under  other  skies, 
Have  you  seen  my  lover  there — 
Did  you  know  him,  brave  and  fair? 
Said  he  when  he  came  this  way — 
In  a  year,  or  in  a  day? 
When  again  you  sip  the  flowers 
Round  that  future  home  of  ours, 
Tell  him  he  will  find  me  leal, 
Sitting  by  my  spinning  wheel, 
Watching  o'er  the  mountain  rim, 
Keeping  all  my  love  for  him, 
Holding  being  in  suspense 
Till  he  come  to  take  me  hence. 


II. 


MOTHER. 

Fie,  child!  here  you  are  again,  idle  and  sighing, 
And  gazing  away  with  a  lackaday  stare; 
Go  call  back  your  fancies  and  set  your  wheel  flying, 
For  while  you  go  dreaming,  the  children  go  bare. 

MARGUERITE. 

O,  mother!  if  you  could  have  done  with  your  fretting, 
And  close  down  your  eyelids,  or  look  far  away, 
And  see, — as  I  see  myself, — stitching  and  netting 
With  fair  dames — yet  somehow  I  fairer  than  they; 


MISCELLANY.  447 

Embroidering  and  tambouring,  braiding,  and  quilting, 
While  soft  sounds  and  odors  steal  into  the  hall, 
And  out  through  the  lattice  we  see  the  knights  tilting 
For  favor  of  beauty — my  favor  of  all; 

You  would  know  how  it  is  my  spindle  stops  turning, 
That  my  purpose  fades  out  and  my  fingers  grow  still, 
While  my  eyes  steal  away  with  unspeakable  yearning 
To  welcome  the  visions  from  over  the  hill. 

MOTHER. 

From  over  the  hill !  ay,  from  over  and  over 
The  hills,  since  the  world  had  a  hill  and  a  girl! 
To  all  of  our  spinning  there  comes  a  high  lover, 
To  most  of  our  choosing  there  comes  but  a  churl. 

MARGUERITE. 

Ah!  no  churl  for  me,  mother,  though  I  die  lonely; 
For  I  was  not  formed  for  a  fate  like  the  rest; 
The  omens  have  told  me  my  knight,  and  him  only, 
Shall  ever  be  crowned  as  the  lord  of  this  breast. 

And  why,  if  he  never  will  come,  should  he  seem  to  be 
Always  about  to  come  over  the  hill  ? 
Or  why,  if  he  never  will  come,  should  I  dream  to  be 
Always  so  fain  and  so  certain  he  will? 

MOTHER. 

Poor  child!  you  are  blowing  a  dangerous  bubble; 
Your  mother  and  wheel  are  your  truest  friends  still; 


448  CALIFORNIA   ANTHOLOGY. 

If  they  bring  you  less  joy,   they  will   leave  you  less 

trouble, 
But  your  Knight  will  fetch  sorrow  from  over  the  hill. 

III. 

MARGUERITE  (singing  to  her  babe.) 

Have  the  elves  disturbed  your  sleep? 
Come,  my  baby,  laugh  and  leap; 
Let  me  by  the  armful  measure 
All  the  vastness  of  my  treasure. 
If  you  knew  your  story,  Pet, 
Would  you  clasp  and  love  me  yet? 
If  I  always  o'er  you  stood, 
Bountiful  of  motherhood, 
Would  it  matter  anything 
That  I  lacked  a  wedding-ring? 
O,  my  beautiful — my  jewel! 
I  was  feeble,  he  was  cruel ; 
His  the  baseness,  mine  the  blame, 
Baby,  baby,  yours  the  shame! 

Clasp  me,  beauty,  hug  and  press; 
/    Will  you  ever  love  me  less  ? 
Better,  howsoe'er  it  grieve  us, 
Bury  love  than  see  it  leave  us. 
I  could  lay  you  low,  Mignon, 
Knowing  you  were  all  my  own, 
With  a  less  reluctant  heart 
Than  to  watch  your  love  depart, 
Following  from  out  my  day 


MISCELLANY.  449 

Footsteps  that  have  died  away. 
O,  my  beautiful — my  jewel! 
I  was  feeble,  he  was  cruel ; 
His  the  baseness,  mine  the  blame, 
Baby,  baby,  yours  the  shame! 

Kiss  me  darling,  clasp  me  tight, 
Strain  with  all  your  baby  might; 
Something  fond  my  nature  misses, 
Yearns  for  love  and  gentle  kisses. 
There!  and  there!  and  there,  Petite! 
But  your  lips  are  pure  and  sweet! 
Grant  that  mine  be  dead  and  gone 
Ere  yours  lisp  a  baby  tone; 
They  would  surely  "Papa"  call; 
I  must  say — if  say  at  all— 
O,  my  beautiful — my  jewel! 
I  was  feeble,  he  was  cruel ; 
His  the  baseness,  mine  the  blame, 
Baby,  baby,  yours  the  shame! 

— Joseph   T.   Goodman, 


341.  THOUGHT. — It  is  true  that  cities   and   king 
doms  die,   but   the  eternal   thought  lives   on.       Great 
thought,  incorporate  with  great  action,  does  not  die,  but 
lives  a  universal   life,  and   its  power  is   felt   vibrating 
through  all  spirit  and  throughout  all  ages. — Gen.   Jas. 
A.  McDougall. 

342.  THE  HIGHEST  GIFT  OF  MIND. — The  gift  of 
expression,  though  not  the  highest,  is  next  to  the  high- 


450  CALIFORNIA   ANTHOLOGY. 

est  gift.  I  conceive  that  the  very  highest  gift  of  mind, 
and  that  which  most  contributes  to  the  progress  of  man 
kind,  is  the  gift  of  invention.  Next  comes  the  gift  of 
expression,  which  can  take  the  new  thought  and  intro 
duce  it  to  the  world,  notwithstanding  the  prepossessions 
and  hostility  of  conservatism.  Here  is  the  magic  in 
fluence  of  eloquence.  The  man  of  commanding  and 
universal  influence  is  a  man  of  a  very  high  order  of 
mind.  He  is  born  king  among  men. — Rev.  W.  E.  Ijams. 

343.  PERSONAL  POWER.  —  In  the  absence  of  a 
quality,  material  or  acquired,  there  is  always  compensa 
tion,  if  not  complete,  at  least  partial.  Public  speaking 
is  an  art  which  I  have  often  coveted.  To  "hold  in  rapt 
attention  a  thousand  listeners  whose  presence  and  sym 
pathy  should  feed  fires  radiating  in  dazzling  conceits,  is 
a  fascination  often  arising  before  the  student  of  ardent 
longings,  and  most  vividly  of  all  in  the  mind  of  him  in 
whom  such  talents  are  lamentably  absent.  Yet  the 
rule  is,  to  which  I  know  there  are  exceptions,  that  the 
brilliant  speaker  is  seldom  the  best  scholar  or  the  most 
profound  thinker. 

It  is  told  of  the  vocalist,  Lablache,  that  by  facial  ex 
pression  he  could  represent  a  thunder-storm,  in  a  most 
remarkable  manner.  The  gloom  which  overshadowed 
the  face,  as  clouds  the  sky,  deepened  into  darkness,  then 
lowered  as  an  angry  tempest.  Lightning  flashed  from 
the  winking  eye,  twitching  the  muscles  of  the  face  and 
mouth,  and  thunder  shook  the  head.  Finally  the  storm 
died  away  and  the  returning  sun  illumined  the  features, 
and  wreathed  the  face  in  smiles. 


MISCELLANY.  451 

Sensitive  as  is  the  actor  to  the  sympathy  or  indiffer 
ence  of  his  audience,  the  author  is  but  little  behind  him.. 
To  talk  or  to  write  without  being  able  to  command  the 
attention  of  the  listener  or  reader,  would  stop  the  mouth 
and  dry  the  pen  about  as  quickly  as  anything. 

There  is  something  irresistible  in  the  tone  and  man 
ner  of  an  eloquent  speaker;  likewise  in  the  glowing 
thoughts  of  a  graceful  writer — as  in  meeting  a  stran 
ger,  we  are  at  first  attracted  by  the  dress  and  polish, 
which  conceal  character,  rather  than  by  qualities  of  the 
head  and  heart  of  which  we  know  nothing.  But  since 
science  now  so  often  strips  from  the  shell  of  things 
their  soft  and  comely  covering,  history  is  no  longer 
willing  to  sacrifice  life  for  meat,  or  the  body  for  raiment. 

— Hubert  H.  Bancroft^ 

344.     EPIGRAMS. 

If  every  Jack  should  mate  his  Jill, 
What  gills  of  Jacks  this  world  would  fill. 

A  dangerous  rock  is  intellect, 

On  which  the  wisest  oft  are  wrecked. 

Nature  from  many  a  rough-hewn  log 
Has  made  a  rougher  pedagogue. 

A  man  who's  leaner  than  a  hawk 
Often  contains  a  ton  of  talk. 

Nothing  in  nature  is  so  dense 

As  what  is  known  as  common  sense. 

Times  are  so  hard — so  Stubbs  confesses — 
He  cannot  now  pay  his  addresses. 


452  CALIFORNIA    ANTHOLOGY. 

Of  Jockeys  Adam  was  the  first  — 
This  fact  is  vouched  by  pundits,  versed 
In  lore  historic — him  they  place 
As  Father  of  the  Human  Race! 

Love,  like  a  sausage,  always  needs 
From  him  or  her  who  on  it  feeds— 
What  is  of  utmost  consequence 
To  its  enjoyment — confidence. 

Though  Wisdom  mankind  lightly  prize 
They  rarely  fail  to  idolize 
A  downright  fool,  when,  richly  rolled 
Like  Israel's  calf,  he  shines  in  gold. 

Beware  of  what  is  called  a  prude; 
Peaches  are  bad  when  over-good. 

Position  does  not  merit  show; 
The  largest  birds  oft  nestle  low: 
While  tiny  insects  rest  so  high 
They're  unseen  by  the  keenest  eye. 

— Hector  A.  St2iart- 

34B.  ORGANIZATION.  —  An  organization  is  far 
greater  than  an  idea,  for  a  principle  is  always  connected 
with  it;  but  it  is  a  corporeal  idea — a  principle  in  action. 
And  what  is  grander  in  the  domain  of  awful  effects  ? 
Until  thus  clothed,  an  idea  is  powerless,  and  bears  about 
the  same  analogy  to  its  active  operations  as  does  a 
shadowy  ghost  to  a  sturdy  man. 

A  crystalized  gem  is  the  most  attractive  form  of  solid 
matter,  because  more  thought  and  skill  are  expended 
in  its  structure  than  in  any  other  stony  combination  of 


MISCELLANY.  453 

atoms.  A  flower  is  of  a  higher  order  of  charm,  for 
more  various  and  more  subtle  elements  are  wrought  into 
its  composite  loveliness ;  and  then  the  provisions  for 
the  growth  and  support  of  the  flower  affect  us  more  pro 
foundly  still — the  mixture  of  the  air,  the  various  powers 
hidden  in  the  sun  ray,  the  alternation  of  day-light 
and  gloom,  the  laws  of  evaporation  and  of  clouds,  and 
the  currents  in  the  air  that  carry  moisture  from  zone  to 
zone  for  the  nutriment  of  vegetation.  We  soon  find  in 
nature  that  no  element  or  force  exists  unrelated.  It  is 
in  harness  with  other  elements,  for  a  common  labor, 
and  an  interchange  of  service  for  a  common  end. 
Organization  is  the  idea  which  'science  impresses  upon 
us  as  the  secret  of  life,  health,  power,  and  beauty  in 
her  realm.  But  the  great  glory  of  organization  is  when 
it  is  revealed  in  human  life.  The  highest  structure  of 
the  creative  art  is  the  body  of  man,  representing  in  its 
complexity  and  the  friendly  partnership  of  its  powers, 
the  system  and  co-ordination  which  society  should  at 
tain;  and  it  is  a  marked  epoch  in  history  when  a  new 
movement  is  made  which  succeeds  in  organizing  men, 
widely  and  permanently,  for  noble  and  beneficent  ends. 

T/ios.   Starr  King. 

346.  HISTORY. — History  isa  magician's  bottle  out  of 
which  we  can  pour  any  kind  of  wine  the  human  appetite 
craves.  Sophocles  pictured  humanity  as  it  ought  to  be. 
Euripides  as  it  was.  Thucydides  wrote  down  democ 
racy;  Tacitus,  imperialism.  Was  either  of  them  true 
to  the  interests  of  the  opposite  side?  Would  they  not 
have  been  accounted  by  their  respective  parties  traitor- 


454    .  CALIFORNIA   ANTHOLOGY. 

ous  fools  had  they  been  wholly  impartial,  and  would  not 
their  names  and  works  have  soon  perished  in  conse 
quence?  Macaulay  looks  upon  the  ills  of  the  English 
poor  two  centuries  back;  Cobbett  and  Hallam  dwell 
more  upon  their  comforts.  Read  one  and  you  would 
imagine  them  the  most  unhappy  of  mortals;  read  the 
others  and  you  would  think  how  much  happier  they 
were  then  than  now.  To  the  character  of  Philip  11^ 
Prescott  applies  the  words,  bigoted,  perfidious,  suspi 
cious,  cruel,  which  were  enough  even  for  so  powerful  a 
prince;  but  when  Motley  adds  to  these  the  terms,  pe 
dant,  and  idiot,  one  begins  to  wonder  how  such  a 
driveller  was  able  to  manage  his  estate  of  half  a  world 
so  long  and  so  well. — Hubert  PL  Bancroft. 

THE  STUDY  OF  MANKIND. 

347.  The  tendency  of  philosophic  inquiry  is  more 
and  more  toward  the  origin  of  things.  In  the  earlier 
stages  of  intellectual  impulse  the  mind  is  almost  wholly 
absorbed  in  ministering  to  the  necessities  of  the  pres 
ent;  next,  the  mysterious  uncertainty  of  the  after  life 
provokes  inquiry,  and  contemplations  of  an  eternity  of 
the  future  command  attention;  but  not  until  knowledge 
is  well  advanced  does  it  appear  that  there  is  likewise 
an  eternity  of  the  past  worthy  of  careful  scrutiny— 
without  which  scrutiny,  indeed,  the  eternity  of  the 
future  must  forever  remain  a  sealed  book.  Standing, 
as  we  do,  between  these  two  eternities,  our  view  limited 
to  a  narrow  though  gradually  widening  horizon,  as 
nature  unveils  her  mysteries  to  our  inquiries,  an  infinity 


MISCELLANY*.  455 

spreads  out  in  either  direction,  an  infinity  of  minuteness 
no  less  than  an  infinity  of  immensity ;  for  hitherto 
attempts  to  reach  the  ultimate  of  molecules  have  proved 
as  futile  as  attempts  to  reach  the  ultimate  of  masses. 
Now  man,  the  noblest  work  of  creatipn,  the  only  reason 
ing-  creature,  standing  alone  in  the  midst  of  this  vast 
sea  of  undiscovered  truth — ultimate  knowledge  ever 
receding  from  his  grasp,  primal  causes  only  thrown 
farther  back  as  proximate  problems  are  solved — man, 
in  the  study  of  mankind,  must  follow  his  researches  in 
both  of  these  directions,  backward  as  well  as  forward, 
must  indeed  derive  his  whole  knowledge  of  what  man 
is  and  will  be,  from  what  he  has  been-.  Thus  it  is  that 
the  study  of  mankind,  in  its  minuteness,  assumes  the 
grandest  proportions.  Viewed  in  this  light  there  is 
not  a  feature  of  primitive  humanity  without  significance; 
there  is  not  a  custom  or  characteristic  of  savage  na 
tions,  however  mean  or  revolting  to  us,  from  which 
important  lessons  may  not  be  drawn.  It  is  only  from 
the  study  of  barbarous  and  partially  cultivated  nations 
that  we  are  able  to  comprehend  man  as  a  progressive 
being,  and  to  recognize  the  successive  stages  through 
which  our  savage  ancestors  have  passed  on  their  way 
to  civilization.  With  the  natural  philosopher  there  is 
little  thought  as  to  the  relative  importance  of  the  mani 
fold  works  of  creation.  The  tiny  insect  is  no  less  an 
object  of  his  patient  scrutiny  than  the  wonderful  and 
complex  machinery  of  the  cosmos.  The  lower  races 
of  men,  in  the  study  of  humanity,  he  deems  of  as 
essential  importance  as  the  higher;  our  present  higher 
races  being  but  the  lower  types  of  generations  yet  to 
come. — Hubert  H.  Bancroft. 

31 


456  CALIFORNIA   ANTHOLOGY. 


THE  PIONEER. 

348.     The  gallant  Pioneer!    He  is  the  noblest  type 
of  American  manhood,  for  he  has 

"  Honor  and  courage; 
Qualities  that  eagle-plume  men's  souls 
And  fit  them  for  the  sun." 

He  climbs  like  a  huge  fly  upon  the  bald  skull  of 
some  lofty  mountain,  and  the  primeval  hills  welcome 
his  daring  footsteps.  He  taps  with  the  prospector's 
pick  at  the  adamantine  doors  of  the  earth's  treasure 
chambers,  and  at  his  demand  they  reveal  their  shin 
ing  secrets.  His  glittering  ax  lays  low  the  green- 
plumed  forest  monarch,  and  on  the  surface  of  the  emer- 
ald-hued  prairies  he  marks  the  sites  of  cities  yet  to  be. 
Not  for  him  the  science  of  the  school,  not  for  him  the 
graces  of  culture,  not  for  him  the  joys  of  home,  not  for 
him  the  sweet  solaces  of  life.  But  he  reads  the  story 
of  the  ages  written  on  the  rocks,  and  hears  the  tale  of 
mysterious  forces  whispered  by  the  mid-night  stars,  and 
the  priest-robed  mountains,  and  the  smiling  lakes,  and 
white-lipped  sunset  seas  are  his  palaces  and  his  kindred. 
Southward  you  shall  behold  him,  undaunted  by  the  roar 
of  the  Colorado,  or  the  stealthy  step  of  the  Apache, 
pressing  onward  and  still  onward  to  listen  to  the  wash 
,of  tropic  waters.  Northward  his  resolute  face  is 
turned  toward  the  wooing  mountains  of  crystal,  until 
the  North  Star  gleams  like  a  mighty  diamond  in  its 
gold  and  crimson  setting  of  northern  lights,  and  the 
sullen  sun  but  for  an  hour  hangs  upon  the  verge  of  the 


MISCELLANY.  457 

polar  night,  a  faint  reminder  of  the  lost  southern  clime 
while  the  booming  artillery  of  the  Ice  King  hails  the 
Pioneer  of  polar  seas.  Westward — ah!  there  is  no 
longer  a  west.  The  iron  lace  with  which  progress 
fringes  her  garments  reaches  now  to  where  the  Golden 
Gate  swings  back  upon  her  hinges.  Asia  and  the  far 
ther  Indies  are  just  beyond,  and  the  Orient  of  Europe 
is  the  Occident  of  America. 

And  still  from  the  silver  and  the  orange  blossom  of 
cactus-fringed  and  snow-crowned  Mexico,  northward  to 
where  the  icebergs  glitter  against  an  Arctic  sky,  our 
Pioneers  are  marching  and  toiling.  In  the  track  which 
their  fierce  feet  are  breaking,  our  country  is  marching 
onward  to  her  greatness.  The  army  of  civilization 
swells  upon  their  pathway.  Art,  Science,  Progress,  the 
Wealth  of  Nations,  the  Power  and  Glory  of  the  Re 
public,  follow.  All  honor  and  all  hail  to  those  brave 
hearts  who  lead  the  vanguard. — Thomas  Fitch. 


TRANSITION. 
349.- 

When  leaves  grow  sere,  all  things  take  sombre  hue, 
The  wild  winds  waltz  no  more  the  woodsides  through, 
All  day  the  faded  grass  is  wet  with  dew. 

A  gauzy  nebula  films  the  pensive  sky, 

The  golden  bee  buzzes  supinely  by, 

In  silent  flocks  the  bluebirds  southward  fly. 


458  CALIFORNIA   ANTHOLOGY. 

The  cynic  frost  is  riotous  of  blame, 

The  forests'  cheeks  are  crimsoned  o'er  with  shame, 

The  ground  with  scarlet  blushes  is  aflame! 

The  one  we  love  grows  lustrous-eyed  and  sad, 
With  sympathy  too  thoughtful  to  be  glad, 
While  all  the  colors  round  are  running  mad. 

The  sunbeams  kiss  askant  the  tawny  hill, 
The  naked  woodbine  climbs  the  window  sill, 
The  air  the  noons  exhale  is  faint  and  chill. 

The  ripened  nuts  drop  downward  day  by  day, 
Sounding  the  hollow  tocsin  of  decay, 
And  bandit  squirrels  smuggle  them  away. 

Vague  sighs  and  scents  pervade  the  atmosphere. 
Sounds  of  invisible  stirrings  hum  the  ear, 
The  morning's  lash  reveals  a  frozen  tear. 

The  hermit  mountains  gird  themselves  with  mail, 
Mocking  the  threshers  with  an  echo  flail, 
The  while  the  afternoons  grow  cold  and  pale. 

Inconstant  Summer  to  the  tropics  flees, 

And,  as  her  rose-sails  catch  the  amorous  breeze, 

Lo!  bare,  brown  Autumn  trembles  to  her  knees. 

The  stealthy  nights  encroach  upon  the  days, 
The  earth  with  sudden  whiteness  is  ablaze, 
And  all  her  paths  are  lost  in  crystal  maze! 

Tread  lightly  where  the  tender  violets  blew— 
Where,  to  Spring  winds  their  soft  eyes  open  flew; 
Safely  they'll  sleep  the  ch'urlish  Winter  through. 


MISCELLANY.  459 

Though  all  Life's  portals  are  indiced  with  woe, 
And  frozen  pearls  are  all  the  world  can  show, 
Feel!     Nature's  breast  is  warm  beneath  the  snow! 

With  blooms  full-lapped  again  will  smile  the  land, 
The  pall  is  but  the  folding  of  His  hand, 
Anon  with  fuller  glories  to  expand! 

The  dumb  heart  hid  beneath  the  wintry  tree 
Will  throb  again;  so  shall  the  torpid  bee 
Drone  on  the  listening  ear  his  drowsy  glee. 

So  shall  the  truant  bluebirds  backward  fly, 
And  all  loved  things  that  vanish  or  that  die 
Return  to  us  in  some  sweet  by-and-by. 

—  W.  A.  Kendall. 


THE  HUMAN   MIND. 

35O.  The  resources  of  the  human  mind  and  the 
energies  of  the  human  will  are  illimitable.  From  the 
time  when  the  new  philosophy,  of  which  Francis  Ba 
con  was  the  great  exponent,  became  firmly  written  in 
a  few  minds,  the  course  of  human  progress  has  been 
unfettered — each  established  fact,  each  new  discovery, 
each  complete  induction,  is  a  new  weapon  from  the 
armory  of  truth;  the  march  cannot  retrograde;  the 
human  mind  will  never  go  back;  the  question  as  to  a 
return  to  barbarism  is  forever  at  rest.  If  England 
were  to  sink  beneath  the  ocean,  she  has  planted  the 
germ  of  her  thought  in  many  a  fair  land  beside,  and 
the  tree  will  shadow  the  whole  earth.  If  the  whole 


460  CALIFORNIA   ANTHOLOGY. 

population  of  America  were  to  die  in  a  day,  a  new  mi 
gration  would  re-people  it,  not  with  living  forms  alone, 
but  with  living  thought,  bright  streams  from  the  foun 
tains  of  all  nations. 

We  turn  with  wonder  and  delight  to  behold  on  every 
hand  the  results  of  scientific  method  everywhere  visi 
ble  and  everywhere  increasing;  but  amid  that  wonder 
and  delight,  we  turn  to  a  still  greater  wonder — the 
human  mind  itself.  Who  shall  now  stay  its  progress? 
What  shall  impede  its  career?  No  longer  trammeled 
by  theories  or  oppressed  by  the  despotism  of  authority, 
grasping,  at  the  very  vestibule,  the  key  to  knowledge, 
its  advance,  though  gradual,  is  but  the  more  sure.  It 
is  engaged  in  a  perpetual  warfare,  but  its  empire  is 
perpetually  enlarging.  No  fact  is  forgotten,  no  truth 
is  lost,  no  induction  falls  to  the  ground.  It  is  as  in 
dustrious  as  the  sun — it  is  as  restless  as  the  sea — it  is 
as  universal  as  the  race  itself — it  is  boundless  in  its  am 
bition,  and  irrepressible  in  its  hope! 

And  yet,  in  the  very  midst  of  the  great  works  that 
mark  its  progress,  while  we  behold  on  every  hand  the 
barriers  of  darkness  and  ignorance  overthrown,  and 
perceive  the  circle  of  knowledge  continually  widening, 
we  must  forever  remember  that  man,  in  all  his  pride  of 
scientific  research,  and  all  his  power  of  elemental  con 
quest,  can  but  follow  at  an  infinite  distance,  the  methods 
of  the  Great  Designer  of  the  Universe.  His  research 
is  but  the  attempt  to  learn  what  nature  has  done  or 
may  do;  his  plans  are  but  an  imperfect  copy  of  a  half- 
seen  original.  He  strives,  and  sometimes  with  success, 


MISCELLANY. 


461 


to  penetrate  into  the  workshop  of  nature;  but  whether 
he  use  the  sunbeam,  or  steam,  or  electricity — whether 
he  discover  a  continent  or  a  star — whether  he  decom 
pose  light  or  water — whether  he  fathom  the  depths  of 
the  ocean  or  the  depths  of  the  human  heart — in  each 
and  all  he  is  but  the  imitator  of  the  Great  Architect 
and  Creator  of  all  things. — Gen.  E.  D.  Baker. 


INDEX. 


[THE  FIGURES  KEFER  TO  THE  PARAGRAPH  NUMBERS.] 


"Affection,  Forgiveness,  Faith," 

Gen.  E.  D.  Baker 137 

"Agassiz,  Louis," 

W.  H.  Call 247 

"Agriculture," 

Samuel  B.  Bell 147,  160,  162 

James  G.  Howard 156 

Thos.  Starr  King. .  .148,  150,  152, 
158,  163. 

Zachary  Montgomery 154 

W.  H.  Rhodes 153 

Tod  Robinson 155 

Leland  Stanford 161 

Joseph  W.  Winans 151 

"All  Does  Not  Fade," 

Rev.  Wm.  Speer 82 

"American  Legion  of  Honor," 

See  ' '  Fraternal  Societies, " . . . .  245 

"Ancient  Order  of  United  Workmen," 

Philip  M.  Fisher 244 

See  "Fraternal  Societies,". . .  .245 

Anderson,  Rev.  T.  H.  B. 

"Books," 47 

"Children," 92 

"Labor," 109 

'  'Architecture, " 

Frank  Tilford 27 

"Art," 

W.  C.  Bartlett 25 

John  W.  Dwinelle 26 

Prof.  Joseph  LeConte 22 

Dr.  A.  B.  Stout 23 

Frank  Tilford 27 

E.G.  Waite 24 

"Asceticism," 

W.  C.  Bartlett 93 

"Atheism," 

Thos.  Starr  King 138 

"Atlantic Cable,  The," 

Gen.  E.  D.  Baker 302 

Judge  E.  D.  Wheeler 303 

"Authorship  in  California," 

W.  C.  Bartlett 301 

"A  Pressed  Flower," 

G.  C.  Hurlbut..  ..324 


Baker,  Gen.  E.  D., 

"Affection,  Forgiveness,  Faith."  137 

"The  Atlantic  Cable," 302 

"  The  Comet  of,  1858," 327 

" The  Human  Mind," 350 

"The  Law,  Bench  and  Bar,"  . .  .312 

"The  Press," 42 

•'Dueling," 165 

"  Freedom," 195,  199 

"  Politics," 180 

"  Our  Country," 220 

"Science," 1 

"War," 202 

"Etc," 57 

"Baker,  Gen.  E.  D.," 

Samuel  B.  Bell 251 

Newton  Booth 248 

Gen.  J.  A.  McDougall 250 

Mrs.  James  Neale 249 

Baldwin,  Judge  Joseph  G., 

"Stephen  J.  Field," 261 

"Aaron  Burr," 256 

"Baldwin,  Joseph  G.," 

Judge  Stephen  J.  Field 252 

Bancroft,  Hubert  H., 

"  The  Brave  Days  of  Old," 77 

"California," 292 

"Catholicity of  Spirit," 168 

'Home," 87 

'  History," 340 

'  Labor," 107,  108,  112,  ]  13 

' Personal  Power," 343 

'  Popular  Corruption," 166 

'Riches," 97,  99 

'  Social  Advance," 171 

'The  Study  of  Mankind," 347 

'Etc," 35,59 

Barnes,  Gen.  W.  H.  L., 

"Recuperative  Power  of  our  Na 
tion,"  215 

Barstow,  George, 

"Death." 321 

"  Freedom," 194 

"Home," 88 

"War," 200 


464 


INDEX. 


Bartlett,  W.  C., 

"Art,".. 25 

"  Asceticism, " 93 

"Authorship  in  California,". . .  .301 

"Books," 46 

"  Gardeijing," 149 

"Wine," 173 

"The  Press," 41 

"California  Humorists," 300 

Bausman,  William, 

"The  Pen," 37 

Bell,  Samuel  B., 

"  Agriculture," 147,  160,  162 

"Gen.  E.  D.  Baker," 251 

Bennett,  Judge  N., 

"Modern  Civilization," 170 

"  The  Common  and  Civil  Law,".  .314 
Bierce,  A.  G., 

"  Science," 18 

Bonte.  Rev.  J.  H.  C., 

"  Men  of  Thought  and  Men  of 

Action," 85 

"Books," 

Rev.  T.  H.  B.  Anderson 47 

W.  C.  Bartlett 46 

Sarah  B.  Cooper 48 

Thos.  Starr  King. .  .44,  45,  49,  50 
Booth,  Newton, 

'  Capital  and  Labor," 184,  186 

'  The  Republic  of  Letters," 39 

' Odd  Fellowship," 238 

'War," 203 

'Our  Country," 206 

'Gen.  E.  D.  Baker," 248 

"Brave  Days  of  Old,  The," 

Hubert  H.  Bancroft 77 

Briggs,  Rev.  M.  C., 

"The  Church  and  Nation," 128 

"Broderick,  David  C," 

John  W.  Dwinelle 253 

Frank  Soule 254 

/Browne,  J.  Ross, 

"Riches," 100 

"The  Gardens  of  the  Peterskoi,".164 
Bunker  William  M., 

"  The  Modoc  Stronghold," 298 

Burnett,  Peter  H., 

"Education," 30 

"Burns,  Robert," 

George  Gordon 255 

"Burr,  Aaron," 

Joseph  G.  Baldwin 256 

"  California :  Authorship  in," 

W.  C.  Bartlett 301 

"California:  A  Girlish  Cleopatra," 
H.H.Bancroft..  ..292 


"California:  Acquisition  of," 

Edmund  Randolph 389 

"California:  Her  Duty  and  Destiny," 

Judge  T.  W.  Freelon 294 

Judge  E.  W.  McKinstry 295 

"California  Humorists," 

W.  C.  Bartlett 300 

"California  Pioneers," 

Edmund  Randolph 290 

"  Calif orniana," 280  to  301 

"Capital  and  Labor," 

Newton  Booth 184,  186 

Henry  George 183,  221 

Jas.  McM.  Shatter 185 

Rev.  H.  Stebbins 187 

Casserly,  Eugene, 

"Our  Country," 214 

"  Washington," 286 

"  Catholicity  of  Spirit," 

Hubert  H.  Bancroft 168 

"  Cause  (the)  Calls  forth  the  man," 
Henry  George   175 

" Centennial  Oration,  1876," 

Rev.  H.  Stebbins 222 

"  Charity," 

Francis  J.  Sullivan 72 

"Chemistry," 

W.  H.  Rhodes 17 

"Children," 

Rev.  T.  H.  B.  Anderson 92 

Gen.  John  A.  Collinsl89,  190,  191 

Henry  George 91 

John  Le  Coute 188 

Zachary  Montgomery 90 

Chas.  H.  Shinn 192 

"Chosen  Friends,  The  Order  of," 

See  "Fraternal Societies,". . .  .245 

"Church  and  State," 

Rev.  M.  C.  Briggs 128 

"  Christ  our  Saviour," 

Edward  Tompkins 119 

Thos.  Starr  King 127 

"Christianity," 

Rev.  W.  E.  Ijams...ll7,  118,  141 

"Christmas," 

Chas.  F.  Craddock 337 

"Civilization,  Modern," 

Judge  N.  Bennett 170 

Clarke,  Chas.  Russell, 

"Thos.  Starr  King," 266 

"Clay,  Webster  and  Calhoun," 

J.  W.  Wiuans 257 

Collins,  Gen.  John  A. 

"  Intemperance,*1 102 

"  Man'a  Mission," 140 

"  Popular  Justice," 167 


INDEX. 


465 


Collins,  Gen.  John  A., 

"The  Rearing  of  Children,". ...  .189 
190,  191. 

"Odd  Fellowship," 240 

"Comet  of  1858," 

Gen.  E.  D.  Baker 327 

"Conservatives  and  Radicals," 

Thos.  Starr  King 174 

Coolbrith,  Ina  D. 

"Discipline," 76 

"Conflict  and  Progress," 

Samuel  Williams 114 

"  Conflict  Eternal," 

Samuel  Williams 83 

Cooper,  Mrs.  Sarah  B. 

'Books," 48 

'Friendship," 94 

'The  Tree  of  Love,"....' 71 

'Woman," 331 

'Social  Artifices," 169 

'Etc." 55,  60,  73 

Craddock,  Chas.  F., 

'Delilah," 335 

'Christmas," 337 

Crittenden,  R.  D. 

"Our  Country," 211 

Curtis,  N.  Greene, 

"Freemasonry," 231 

Dall,  W.  H. 

"Death  of  Agassiz  " 247 

Davidson,  Prof.  Geo.  - 

"Science," 7 

"Death," 

George  Barstow 321 

Rev.  F.  C.  Ewer 322 

Thos.   Starr  King 320 

Gen.  J.  A.  McDougall 319 

Oscar  T.  Shuck 323 

"  Decay  of  Empires," 

Thos.  Starr  King 177 

Deering,  F.  P. 

"  Novels," 51 

"Delilah," 

C.  F.  Craddock 335 

"  Dickens  in  Camp," 

F.  Bret.  Harte 258 

"Discipline," 

Ina  D.  Coolbrith 76 

"  Distinguished  Men," 246  to  286 

"  Drawing," 

Dr.  A.  B.  Stout 23 

"Drunk  in  the  Street," 

Daniel  O'Connell 104 

"Dueling," 

Gen.  E.  D.  Baker 165 

"Durant,  Henry," 

JohnB.  Feltou..  .  .259 


Martin  Kellogg 260 

"Duty," 

Thos.  Starr  King 54 

Dwinelle,  John  W., 

"Sculpture," 26 

"  David  C.  Broderick," 253 

"H.  H.  Haight," 262 

"  San  Francisco, " 297 

"Education," 

Newton  Booth 39 

Peter  H.  Burnett 30 

Rev.  F.  C.  Ewer 32 

John  B.  Felton 53 

B.  B.  Redding 31 

Rev.  H.  Stebbins 28 

Jos.  W.  Winans 29,  33,  35 

"El  Rio  Sacramento," 

Gen.  L.  H.  Foote 296 

"Epigrams," 

Hector  A.  Stuart 344 

"Evolution," 

Prof.  Jos.  LeConte 12,  13 

"Evolution  and  Materialism," 

Prof.  Jos.  LeConte 11 

"Evolution  of  Mind," 

Dr.  A.  B.  Stout 36 

Ewer,  Rev.  F.  C., 

"Death," 322 

"  Teaching," 30 

'•Woman," 332 

"Example,  the  Influence  of," 

Henry  George 81 

"Etc." 

Gen.  E.  D.  Baker 57 

Hubert  H.  Bancroft 59,  135- 

Sarah  B.  Cooper 55,  60,  73 

Rev.  Dr.  Thos.  Guard 123 

Rev.  W.  E.  Ijaras 61,  75 

Thos.  Starr  King  .  .58,  62,  64,  77 
"Faith," 

T.  W.  Freelon 136 

"Farming,"  (see  Agriculture.) 
' '  Farewell  to  Syria, " 

John  F.  Swift 325 

Felton,  John  B. 

"  Freemasonry," 232 

"God," 121 

"  The  Law,  Bench  and  Bar," 307 

"  Maximilian," .259 

"Napoleon  Bonaparte," 272 

"Pleasures,  Physical  and  ^..lental"  38 

"  Science," 18 

"  Sympathy," 95 

"The  Suspicious  Man," 81 

"Truth," 86 

"Field,  Stephen  J." 

Jos.  G.  Baldwin 281 


466 


INDEX. 


Field,  Stephen  J. 

"Jos.  G.  Baldwin," 252 

"Edward  Norton," 275 

"  Law,  Bench  and  Bar," 309 

Finney,  Selden  J. 

"The  Spiritual  Feeling," 144 

Fisher,  Philip  M. 

"The  United  Workmen," 244 

Fitch,  Thomas, 

"  Our  Country," 204 

"  The  Order  of  Red  Men." 243 

"The  Pioneers," 348 

"The  Press," 43 

"  William  C.  Ralston," 277 

Foote,  Gen.  L.  H. 

"  El  Rio  Sacramento," 296 

"Fraternal  Societies," 223  to  245 

"Freedom," 

Gen.  E.  D.  Baker 195,  199 

Geo.  Barstow 194 

Henry  George 197 

Dr.  J.  C.  Shorb 193 

Joseph  W.  Winans 196 

E.  C.  Winchell 198 

Freelon,  Judge  T.  W., 

"Faith," 136 

"  Onr  Country," 209 

"  Our  Duty  and  Destiny," 294 

"  Freemasonry, " 

N.  Greene  Curtis 231 

John  B.  Felton 232 

Dr.  H.  M.  Gray 228 

Henry  E.  Highton 233 

Thos.  Starr  King. .  .223,  224,  225, 
226,  227. 

Milton  S.  Latham 230 

Frank  Tilford 234,  235 

Samuel  M.  Wilson 229 

Fremont,  Gen.  John  C., 

"Recrossing  the  Rocky  Mount 
ains."  326 

"Free  Trade," 

Henry  E.  Highton 181 

"Friendship," 

Sarah  B.  Cooper 94 

"Gardening," 

W.  C.  Bartlett 149 

Chas.  H.  Shinn 159 

"Gardens  of  Peterskoi," 

J.  Ross  Browne 164 

"Garibaldi  and  Washington," 

Dr.  Franklin  Tuthifl 288 

"Genius," 

Thos.  Starr  King 338,  339 

George,  Henry, 

"  Capital  and  Labor," 183 


"Children," 91 

"Freedom," 197 

"Immortality," 131 

" Influence  of  Example," 81 

"  One-sided  Progress," 176 

"Our  Land  Policy," 221 

"The  Cause  Calls  the  Man, "....175 

"The  Future  Life," 146 

"Ghosts," 

Thos.  Starr  King 66 

"God," 

JohnB.  Felton 121 

Thos.  Starr  King 116 

Prof.  Jos.  LeConte 125 

Goodman,  Jos.  T., 

"Over  the  Hill," 340 

Gordon,  George, 

"Robert  Burns," 255 

Gray,  Dr.  H.  M., 

"Freemasonry," 228 

"Greatness," 

Thos.  Starr  King 78,  246 

Guard,  Rev.  Thos., (See  Etc.,  120) 

"  Henry  H.  Haight," 

John  W.  Dwindle 262 

Hallidie,  A.  S. 

"  Labor," 106 

Hamilton,  Rev.  L. 

"Oscar  L.  Shafter," 278 

Harmon,  John  B. 

"Odd  Fellowship," 241 

Harte,  F.  Bret, 

"  Dickens  in  Camp," 258 

"  Thos.  Starr  King," 265,  267 

"Harte,  F.  Bret," 

W.  C.  Bartlett 300 

Hayes,  William, 

"Woman," 334 

Highton,  Henry  E. 

"  Freemasonry," 233 

"Fiee  Trade," 181 

"Woman," , 333 

"History," 

Hubert  H.  Bancroft 346 

"Holiness," 

Prof.  Jos.  LeConte 124 

"Holmes,  Oliver  Wendell," 

Henry  H.  Reid 263 

"Home," 

Hubert  H.  Bancroft 87 

Geo.  Barstow 88 

Thos.  Starr  King 89 

Chas.  H.  Shinn 159 

"Horticulture,"  (See  "Gardening.") 
Howard,  James  G. 

"Farming," 156 


INDEX. 


467 


"Labor," 110 

"Marriage," 70 

"  Human  Temple,  The," 

Thos.  Starr  King 79 

"Humorists of  California," 

W.  C.  Bartlett 300 

Hurlbut,  G.  C. 

"  A  Pressed  Flower," 324 

Ijams,  Rev.  W.  E., 

•'Christianity," 117,  118,  141 

' Decline  of  Orthodoxy," 123 

'  Emotional  Religion," 122 

'  Religion," 143 

•Woman," 330 

'The  Highest  Gift  of  Mind,"  .  .342 

(See  also  "Etc.,") 61,  75 

"Immortality," 

Henry  George 131 

W.  A.  Kendall 133 

Thos.  Starr  King 129,  130 

Prof.  Jos.  LeConte 132 

"Infinity," 

Prof.  Jos.  LeConte 134 

'•Intellectual  Honesty," 

Rev.  H.  Stebbins 34 

"Intemperance," 

Gen.  John  A.  Collins 102 

Daniel  O'Connell 104 

Thos.  Starr  King 103 

Dr.  A.  B.  Stout 101 

"Irish  Race,  The," 

Francis  J.  Sullivan 336 

"  Jenner,  Edward," 

Dr.  J.  C.  Shorb 264 

"Justice," 

Frank  Tilford 63 

Kellogg,  Prof.  Martin, 

"  Henry  Durant," 260 

Kendall,  W.  A.," 

"  Immortality," 132 

' '  Transition, " 349 

Kewen,  Col.  E.  J.  C., 

"John  A.  Sutter," 284 

King,  Thomas  Starr, 

"Agriculture," 148,  150,  152, 

158,  163. 

"Atheism," 138 

"Books," 44,  45,  49,  50 

"Conservatives and  Radicals, " .  .174 

Dying  Words  of 320 

" Decay  of  Empires," 177 

"Duty," 54 

"Freemasonry," 223,  224,  225, 

226  227 

"Genius," 338,  339 

"Ghosts," 66 


"God," 116 

" Great  Men," 246 

"Greatness," 78 

"Home," 89 

'Immortality," 129,  130 

'  Intemperance, " 103 

'Life," 96 

'  Love, " 65 

'  National  Character," 182 

'Nature," 315,  317 

'  Noble  Lives," 68 

'Novels," 52 

'  Organization," 345 

' Originality," 74 

'  Our  Moral  Inheritance," 172 

'  Prescott  and  Macaulay," 274 

'  Revivals, " 145 

'Riches," 98 

'Socrates," 281,  282 

'Style," 40 

'  The  Human  Temple, " 79 

'  The  Inner  Life," 126 

'  The  Words  of  Christ," 127 

'Washington," 287 

(See  also  "Etc.,".  .58,  62,  64,  67) 
"King,  Thos.  Starr, 

Chas.  Russell  Clarke 266 

F.  Bret  Harte 265,  267 

"Labor," 

Rev.  T.  H.  B.  Anderson 109 

Hubert  H.  Bancroft 107,  108, 

112,  113. 

A.  S.  Hallidie 106 

James  G.  Howard    : 110 

Jos.  W.  Winans Ill 

"Lafayette," 

Milton  S.  Latham 268 

"Land  and  Land  Policy,  Our," 

Henry  George 221 

"  Law,  Bench  and  Bar," 206  to  314 

Latham,  Milton  S., 

"  Freemasonry," 230 

"Our  Country," 267 

"  Lafayette," 268 

"Science," 3,  9 

LeConte,  Prof.  John, 

"  The  Rearing  of  Children," 188 

LeConte,  Prof.  Joseph, 

"Art," 22 

"  Evolution," 12,  13 

"Evolution  and  Materialism,". .    11 

"  Foreknowledge  of  God," 125 

"Holiness," 124 

"  Immortality," 133 

"Infinity," 134 

"Science,". . . .  2,  4,  5,  6,  10,  11,  15 


4G8 


INDEX. 


"Lessons  of  the  Hour," 

Cbas.  H.  Shinn ,  ..115 

"  Life,  The  Conduct  of," ...  .54  to  115 
"Life,  What  it  May  Be." 

Thos.  Starr  King 96 

"Life,  The  Inner," 

Thos.  Starr  King 126 

"Life,  This  Leads  to  Another," 

Henry  George 146 

"  Literature  and  Education,"  28  to  53 
"Love," 

Sarah  B.  Cooper 71 

Th«s.  Starr  King 65 

"Macaulay  and  Prescott," 

Thos.  Starr  King 274 

"Mankind,  The  Study  of," 

Hubert  II.  Bancroft 347 

"Man's  Mission," 

Gen.  John  A.  Collins 140 

"Marriage," 

Jas.  G.  Howard 70 

Marshall,  E.  C. 

"  California  Pioneers," 291 

"  Our  Country, " 205 

"Masonry,"  (See  "  Freemasonry.") 
"Materialism," 

Dr.  A.  B.  Stout 304 

McDonald,  Dr.  R.  H. 

"  Smoking," 105 

McDougall,  Gen.  James  A., 

"Gen.  E.  D.  Baker," 250 

"Death," 319 

"  Thought," 341 

McKinstry,  Judge  E.  W., 

"Our  Duty  and  Destiny," 295 

"Medicine,  the  Science  of," 

Dr.  J.  Campbell  Shorb 305 

"  Men  of  Thought  and  Men  of  Action," 

Rev.  J.  H.  C.   Bonte 86 

"Mind,  The  Human," 

Gen.  E.  D.  Baker 350 

"Mind,  The  Evolution  of," 

Dr.  A.  B.  Stout 36 

"  Mind,  The  Highest  Gift  of," 

Rev.  W.  E.  Ijams 342 

Montgomery,  Zachary, 

"  Children," 90 

"  The  Farmer," 154 

"Moore,  Thomas," 

Francis  J.  Sullivan 270 

Oscar  T.  Shuck 271 

"Morality  Essential  to  success," 

Dr.  G.  A.  Shurtleff 80 

"Mulford,  Prentice," 

W.  C.  Bartlett 300 


' '  Napoleon  Bonaparte, " 

John  B.  Felton 272 

"  National  Character," 

Thos.  Starr  King 182 

"Nature," 

Thos.  Starr  King 315,  317 

Jas.  McM.  Shafter 316 

Chas.  Warren  Stoddard 318 

Neale,  Mrs.  James, 

"Gen.  E.  D.  Baker," 249 

"Noble  Lives," 

Tho  .  Starr  King 68 

"Norton,  Edward," 

Judge  Stephen  J.  Field 275 

"Novels," 

F.  P.  Deering 51 

Thos.  Starr  Kinj 52 

"Odd  Fellowship,"  " 

Newton  Booth 238 

Gen.  John  A.  Collins 240 

John  B.  Harmon L'4 1 

Geo.  R.  Moore 237 

L.  E.  Pratt 242 

A.  A.  Sargent 239 

Chas.  A.  Sumner 236 

"One-sided  Progress," 

Henry  George 176 

"Organization," 

Thos.  Starr  King 345 

"Originality," 

Thos.  Starr  King 74 

"Orthodoxy,  Decline  of," 

Rev.  W.  E.  Ijams 123 

"Our  Country," 

Gen.  E.  D.  Baker 220 

Gen.  W.  H.  L.  Barnes iT, 

Newton  Booth 206 

Eugene  Casserly 214 

R.  D.  Crittenden '211 

Thomas  Fitch 204 

T.  W.  Freelon 209 

Milton  S.  Latham 207 

E.  C.  Marshall 205 

F.  M.  Pixley 216 

Rev.  Dr.  A.  L.  Stone 212 

J.  H.Warwick 213- 

Jos.  W.  Winans.208,  210,  217,  219 
E.  C.  Winchell 218 

"Our  Moral  Inheritance," 

Thos.  Starr  King 172 

O'Connell,  Daniel, 

"  Drunk  in  the  Street," 104 

"Over  the  Hill," 

Jos.  T.  Goodman 340 


INDEX. 


469 


"Parker,  Samuel," 

Chas.  A.  Sumner. 236 

"Patriotism," 

Hubert  H.  Bancroft 178 

Newton  Booth 179 

"  Pen,  The," 

William  Bausman 37 

"  Personal  Power," 

Hubert  H.  Bancroft 343 

"Pioneers  of  California," 

E.  C.  Marshall 291 

Pixley,  Frank  M., 

"Our  Country," 216 

"Plato," 

Dr.  J.  Campbell  Shorb 273 

Platt,  Rev.  Win.  H., 

"  The  Unity  of  Laws,"  313 

"Pleasures,  Physical  and  Mental," 

John  B.  Felton 38 

POETRY. — 
"Louis  Agassiz," 

W.  H.  Dall 247 

"Gen.  E.  D.  Baker," 

Mrs.  Jas.  Neale 249 

"Christmas," 

Chas.  F.  Craddock 335 

"Death," 

Oscar  T.  Shuck 323 

"Delilah," 

Chas.  F.  Craddock 337 

" Dickens  in  Camp," 

F.  Bret  Harte 258 

"Discipline," 

Ina  D.  Coolbrith 76 

"  Drunk  in  the  Street," 

Daniel  O'Connell 104 

"El  Rio  Sacramento,"  4 

Gen.  L.  II.  Foote 296 

"  Immortality," 

W.  A.  Kendall 133 

"  On  a  Pressed  Flower," 

G.  C.  Hurlbut 324 

"Over  the  Hill," 

Jos.  T.  Goodman 340 

"  Recrossingthe  Rocky  Mountains," 

Gen.  J.  C.  Fremont 326 

"  Thos.  Starr  King," 

Chas.  Russell  Clarke 266 

F.  Bret  Harte 265,  267 

" Lessons  of  the  Hour," 

Chas.  H.  Shinn 115 

"Thomas  Moore," 

Oscar  T.  Shuck 271 

"The  Mist," 

Miss  H.  M.  Skidmore. .         .  .328 


.329 


"The  North  Wind," 

Prof.  E.  R.  Sill 

"Nature," 

Chas.  Warren  Stoddard 318 

"  Science," 

A.  G.  Bierce  . , 19 

"Sunrise  from  the  Sierras," 

Chas.  A.  Sumner 293 

"Transition," 

W.  A.  Kendall..  ..349 


"  Politics,  The  Pursuit  of," 

Gen.  E.  D.  Baker 180 

"  Popular  Corruption," 

Hubert  H.  Bancroft 166 

"  Popular  Justice, " 

Gen.  John  A.  Collins 167 

Pratt,  L.  E., 

"Odd  Fellowship" 242 

Pratt,  O.  C.,  (See  Law,  Bench  and 

Bar.) 311 

"  Prescott  and  Macaulay, 

Thos.  Starr  King .274 

"Press,  The," 

Gen.  E.  D.  Baker 42 

W.  C.  Bartlett 41 

Thos.  Fitch 43 

Proffatt,  John, 

' '  The  Law,  Bench  and  Bar, " ....  308 
"Punctuality," 

Dr.  G.  A.  Shurtleff 56 

"Radicals  and  Conservatives," 

Thos.  Starr  King 174 

"Ralston,  William  C.," 

Thos.  Fitch 277 

Dr.  J.  CampbeU  Shorb 276 

Randolph,  Edmund, 

"  The  Acquisition  of  California,  ".289 

"The  California  Pioneers," 290 

' '  Recuperative  Power  of  the  Na 
tion," 

Gen.  W.  H.  L.  Barnes 215 

Redding,  B.  B., 

"  Sanitary  Influence  of  Trees,". .  157 

"Teaching," 31 

"Red  Men,  Order  of," 

Thos.  Fitch 243 

Reid,  Henry  H., 

"  Law,  Bench  and  Bar," 306 

" Oliver  Wendell  Holmes," 263 

"Republic  of  Letters,  The," 

Newton  Booth 39 

"Revivals,  The  Corrupting  Influence  of " 
Thos.  Starr  King 145 


470 


INDEX. 


"Religion  and  The  Future  Life," 
116  to  146. 

"Religion  and  Science," 

Rev.  Dr.  W.  A.  Scott 20 

Rev.  Horatio  Stebbins 21 

Rhodes,  Win.  H., 

"Apostrophe  to  Chemistry," ....   17 
"The  Farmer," 153 

"Riches," 

Hubert  H.  Bancroft 97,  99 

J.  Rofrs  Browne 100 

Thos.  Starr  King 98 

.Robinson,  Tod, 

"  The  Farmer," 155 

"Rocky  Mountains,  llecrossing," 

Gen.  J.  C.  Fremont 326 

Royce,  Josiab, 

"Perey  Bysshe  Shelley,". 280 

"  Rural  Homes," 

Ciias.  H.  Sliinn 159 

"San  Francisco," 

John  W.  Dwinelle 297 

Bargeut,  A.  A. 

"  Odd  Fellowship, " 239 

"Sceptic,  The," 

Dr.  J.  Campbell  Shorb 142 

"Science," 

Gen.  E.  D.  Baker 1 

A.  G.  Bierce 19 

Prof.  Geo.  Davidson 7 

JohnB.  Felton 18 

Milton  S.  Latham 3,     9 

Prof.  Jos.  LeConte,  2,  4,  5,  6,  10, 
11,  15. 

W.  H.  Rhodes 17 

Oscar  T.  Shuck 16 

Rev.  1 1  oratio  Stebbins 8 

"  Science  and  Art," 

John  V.  Wattson 14 

"  Science  and  Religion," 

Rev.  Dr.  W.  A.  Scott 20 

Rev.  Horatio  Stebbins 21 

Scott,  Rev.  Dr.  W.  A. 

"  Science  and  Religion," 20 

"  Sculpture," 

John  W.  Dwinelle. 26 

Shatter,  Jas.  McM. 

"  Capital  and  Labor,"   185 

" Communion  with  Nature," ...  .316 

"Shafter,  Oscar  L." 

Rev.  L.  Hamilton 278 

"  Shakespeare, :> 

Frank  Tilford 279 

Shattuck,  Judge  D.  O., 

(See  "Law,  Bench  and  Bar,"). 310 


"Shelley,  Percy  Bysshe," 

Josiah  Royce 280 

Shinn,  Chas.  H., 

"  Lessons  of  the  Hour," 115 

"  Rural  Homes," 159 

"Rearing  of  Children," 192 

Shorb,  Dr.  J.  Campbell, 

"  Freedom," 193 

"  Edward  Jenner," 264 

"Plato," 273 

"  William  C.  Ralston," 276 

"  The  Sceptic, " 142 

"The  Science  of  Medicine," 305 

Shnck,  Oscar  T., 

"Thomas  Moore," 271 

"  Death," 323 

"Fraternal Insurance  Societies, ".245 

"Science," 16 

Shurtleff,  Dr.  G.  A., 

"  Morality  Essential  to  Success,"  80 

"  Punctuality," 56 

Sill,  Prof.  E.  R., 

"The  North  Wind," 329 

Skidmore,  Miss  H.  M., 

"The  Mist," 328 

"Smoking," 

Dr.  R.  H.  McDonald 105 

"  Social  Advance," 

Hubert  H.  Bancroft 171 

"  Social  Artifices," 

Sarah  B.  Cooper 169 

"  Socrates," 

Thos.  Starr  King 281,  282 

Soulc,  Frank, 

"  David  C.  Broderick," 254 

Speer,  Rev.  Wm., 

"All  Does  Not  Fade," 82 

"  Spiritual  Feeling,  The," 

Selden  J.  Fiiiney 140 

Stanford.  Leland, 

"Agriculture," 161 

Stanly,  Edward, 

"  Washington," 285 

Stebbins,  Rev.  Horatio, 

'  Capital  and  Labor," 187 

'  Centennial  Oration,  1876," ...  .222 

'  Education," 28 

'  Intellectual  Honesty," 34 

'  Science," 8 

'  Science  and  Religion," 21 

Stoddard,  Chas.  Warren, 

"Nature," 318 

Stone,  Rev.  Dr.  A.  L., 

"  Our  Country," 212 

Stout,  Dr.  A.  B., 


INDEX. 


471 


"  Drawing," 23 

"  Evolution  of  Mind," 36 

"  Intemperance," 101 

"  Materialism," 304 

Stuart,  Hector  A., 

' '  Epigrams, " 344 

"Style," 

Thomas  Starr  Kiug 40 

Sullivan,  Francis  J., 

'  Charity," 72 

'  Thomas  Moore," 270 

'  The  Irish  Race," 336 

Su  nner,  Chas.  A. , 

' Odd  Fellowship," 236 

'  Sunrise  from  the  Sierras," . . .  .293 
"  Sunrise  from  the  Sierras," 

Chas.  A.  Sumner 293 

"Suspicious  Man,  The," 

JohnB.  Felton 84 

' '  Sutter,  John  A, " 

Col.  E.  J.  C.  Kewen 284 

Joseph  W.  Winans 283 

Swift,  John  F., 

"  A  Farewell  to  Syria," 325 

"  Sympathy," 

John  B.  Felton 95 

"  Teaching," 

Rev.  F.  C.  Ewer 32 

B.  B.  Eedding 31 

"The  Mist," 

Miss  H.  M.  Skidmore 328 

"The  North  Wind," 

E.  R.  Sill 329 

"Thought," 

Gen.  J.  A.  McDougall 341 

"  Thoughts,  Let  them  Grow," 

M.  J.  Upham 69 

Tilford,  Frank, 

"  Architecture," 27 

' '  Freemasonry, " 234,  235 

"  Justice," 63 

"  Shakespeare, " 279 

Tompkins,  Edward, 

"Christ," 119 

"  Transition," 

W.  A.  Kendall 349 

"  Trees,  Sanitary  Influence  of," 

B.  B.  Redding 157 

"Truth," 

John  B.  Felton 86 

Tuthill,  Dr.  Franklin, 

"  Washington  and  Garibaldi,"  .  .288 


"  Twain,  Mark," 

W.  C.  Bartlett 300 

Upham,  M.  J., 

' '  Let  Your  Thoughts  Grow, "...   69 
Waite,  E.  G., 

"Art," 24 

"War," 

Gen.  E.  D.  Baker 202 

George  Barstow 200 

Newton  Booth 203 

Samuel  Williams 201 

Warwick,  J.  H., 

"  Our  Country," 213 

"  Washington," 

Eugene  Casserly ....    : 286 

Thos.  Starr  King 287 

Edward  Stanly 285 

"  Washington  and  Garibaldi," 

Dr.  Franklin  Tuthill 288 

Wattson,  John  V., 

"Science  and  Art," 14 

Wheeler,  Judge  E.  D., 

"  The  Atlantic  Cable," 303 

"  Wildey,  Thomas, " 

Charles  A.  Sumner 236 

Williams,  Samuel, 

"  Conflict  and  Progress," 114 

"  Conflict  Eternal," 83 

"War," 201 

Wilson,  Samuel  M., 

"  Freemasonry," 229 

Winans,  Joseph  W., 

"  Agri culture," 151 

"Clay,  Webster  and  Calhoun, " . 257 

"  Education," 29,  33,  35 

"Freedom," 196 

"Labor," Ill 

"Our  Country, " . . 208,  210,  21 7,219 

"Religion," 139 

"  Gen.  John  A.  Sutter," 283 

"  Wine," 

W.  C.  Bartlett 173 

Winchell,  E.  C., 

"Freedom,"  .'. 198 

"Our  Country," 218 

"Woman," 

Sarah  B.  Cooper 331 

Kev.  F.  C.  Ewer 332 

William  Hayes 334 

Henry  E.  Highton 333 

Rev.  W.  E.  Ijams 330 


